Expectation Fails
by LilinasWrites
Summary: In a D/s AU where your soulmate's name appears on your wrist (left for dom, right for sub) during puberty, Kurt and Blaine are marked with each other's names. But Kurt, the dom, is a 16-year-old high school student and Blaine, the sub, is his 27-year-old history teacher.
1. Chapter One

It was three months before his seventeenth birthday when the name of Kurt Hummel's soulmate finally revealed itself. He woke up on a rainy Thursday morning with an annoying itch on his left wrist. He had long since stopped jumping at every twitch and twinge, so at first the significance of the strange sensation escaped him. He was much more concerned with the significance of the wet, gray sky outside his window.

"Perfect." Kurt stretched and groaned, and scratched absently at his wrist while making a face at the gloomy morning. The weather forecast hadn't said anything about rain. Now he was going to have to completely rethink today's outfit.

It wasn't until he was actually in his closet debating which jacket provided just the right combination of style and function that the itch flared up enough to pull his attention away from his immediate sartorial problems. His wrist was itching. His left wrist.

He held his arm up to the light in the closet, but there was nothing to see. His skin was as pale and unmarked as ever. But it was definitely prickling more than it should for a simple itch. Kurt had watched all of his friends go through this and he knew that the actual appearance of a readable name could and probably would take hours.

"Calm down. This could still be a false alarm," he told his hammering heart. His heart didn't listen. Instead it made him reach up to the top shelf and root around until his fingers found the box that his father had given him on his thirteenth birthday. He took it down and went back to sit on the end of his bed and lift the lid.

Nestled in tissue paper, the dark brown leather of the cuff shone just as beautifully as it had the day it had been purchased. Kurt ran a finger over the silver buckle before lifting the cuff out of the box. The thought of finally getting to wear it made Kurt's heart beat even faster. He sometimes felt like he'd been waiting forever. It wasn't unheard of to be unmarked at almost seventeen, but it was unusual. All of his friends had long since started sporting the cuffs, on their left or right wrists signifying dom or sub, that covered and kept private the names of their soulmates.

Another, stronger prickle under his skin made him jump so hard he almost dropped the cuff. He reached over and switched on the vanity light to inspect his wrist again. And then he saw it. His stomach did a flip-flop when he realized that tiny red welts were forming on his skin. This _was_ it. This had to be it. He could wear the cuff and finally, _finally_, put an end to all the "Of course you don't have a soulmate, Hummel, who'd want your freaky ass on your knees for them?" comments from the jocks. And his left wrist. Dominant, he thought smugly. Dominant. Which he'd always known. Despite everyone and their brother assuming he'd be a sub. He was dominant and he could wear his cuff to school and today was going to be a perfect day despite the havoc unexpected rain was wreaking on his wardrobe plans.

Except . . . well, who could forget the Jacob Ben Israel debacle of freshman year? People had literally fallen off chairs (Puck did it in math class) at the sight of Jacob, of all people, wearing a cuff before anyone else. On his left wrist. Giving his incredulous friends little peeks at the welts it covered. By lunch even the seniors were whispering about it. How the hell had little Jacob Ben Israel gotten his mark before anyone else in his class? And in what universe could he be considered dominant?

It turned out what Jacob had gotten was impetigo. He'd also shared it with several people who he'd allowed to touch his "mark." The only thing worse than the treatment Jacob received when he returned to school, cuffless, after the lesions healed was the treatment he received eight months later when he came to school with the same leather cuff on his right wrist. Yeah, there was no way Kurt was putting that cuff on until he was really, really sure this was it.

But going to school without the cuff was a problem too. If this was it, well, soulmate names were private. Seeing someone's mark was kind of intimate, like seeing them naked. You might have to show your mark to a doctor, or for some legal reason, but to have the name finally appear on his wrist in the middle of French class was something Kurt was not going to risk. He set the cuff carefully back in its tissue paper nest and settled the lid on top.

Okay, plan. He'd shower, do his normal morning routine, get dressed, and then if he still wasn't sure he'd just sit in his room and wait. Better to be late for school than have one more thing to be ridiculed for for the rest of his high school career.

But he didn't have to wait after all. By the time he was pushing his arms into the sleeves of his dark blue button-down the initial itching had changed to more of a deep almost pain and another inspection in his vanity light showed that more red welts were appearing and some of them were starting to arrange themselves into discernible letter shapes. There was definitely a d, and what looked like the beginnings of an n.

Kurt sat for a long moment just staring at those two little letters. This was really, really it. He was a dom, and somewhere in the world (the country? Ohio?) was a sub with Kurt's name on his wrist. And even though he'd been waiting for this day since he was thirteen years old, now that it was here it felt a little overwhelming. Slipping the leather cuff over the welts and pulling the strap tight left him breathless.

On the whole, the day passed faster than Kurt expected. His family had been surprised and delighted when he came to breakfast with the cuff wrapped around his wrist. Carole had beamed at him and promised to enroll him in dom classes as soon as possible; Finn had shaken Kurt's hand with a ridiculously formal "Welcome to the club, old man!" then winked and said "I guess we both surprised 'em!" waving his own cuffed right arm. His father had tried unsuccessfully to hide the tears that started in his eyes, but he'd also pulled Kurt aside right before the boys left to ask him if he was really, _really_ sure this was it. When Kurt assured him that he was already seeing letters, Burt had to hide his face again.

His friends were all gratifyingly excited; although the universal astonishment that he was a dom had started to grate on him by lunch time. Oddly enough, only Santana had been unsurprised, dismissing everyone's exclaiming with a simple, "Please. I know an alpha bitch when I see one." The hardest part had been trying to concentrate on lessons while resisting the temptation to peek under his cuff to check on the progress of the name. But by and large the day moved quickly, he enjoyed all the attention, and the football crowd was remarkably silent on the addition to his personal wardrobe. Maybe they were simply too stunned to react.

Before he knew it he was back home that afternoon, locked safe in his bedroom, pulling open the buckle on the cuff. This time the red welted letters were easy to read.

_Blaine Anderson._

The first thing Kurt felt was a twinge of relief that it was actually a boy's name. He hadn't really expected a girl – Miss Pillsbury had assured him that since he was gay his soulmate would be as well – but there were stories . . . well, you just never knew what kind of tricks fate would play.

The second thought was that it was a beautiful name.

Blaine Anderson.

Very elegant. Kurt was sure he'd have loved his soulmate even if his name was Hugo or Clyde, but it was nice to have such a lovely name on his wrist.

Blaine Anderson.

His soulmate. His sub. The person whose welfare he would someday be responsible for. He stroked his fingers over the raised lines of the welts and wondered where Blaine Anderson was at that exact moment. Was he stroking Kurt's name on his own wrist? Or maybe it hadn't appeared quite yet. Although, Kurt's mark had appeared so late that even if Blaine was younger he may have already had his for some time. It was strange to think that at this moment, somewhere, another boy – Blaine – might be staring at Kurt's name on his own wrist and wondering all the same things about him.

* * *

><p>Blaine Anderson had, in fact, been contemplating the name on his own right wrist since it had appeared when he was thirteen and a half. In other words, for almost fourteen years – literally half his life. It wasn't unheard of to get your mark at such a young age, but it was certainly unusual. He hadn't even had a cuff; he'd been late for school that day because his mom had to make an emergency trip to the mall. He was so young that he hadn't really come to terms with the fact that he was gay, much less a sub, so the name "Kurt Hummel" on his right wrist had turned his world upside-down in more ways than one.<p>

He wasn't sure whether the appearance of the name spurred the sense of submissiveness he began to feel or if it would have happened eventually in any case. Before Kurt Hummel, Blaine's masturbatory fantasies had been pretty teenager generic. But after, he found himself imagining Kurt's voice whispering in his ear, giving instruction, telling him how fast to stroke himself, where to touch, when to come. It was new and darkly thrilling and Blaine couldn't wait for Kurt to make an appearance in the real world.

Everyone seemed to think that getting his mark so early meant he would meet his soulmate early as well, but months and years went by with no sign of Kurt Hummel. When he started his freshman year at James Madison High School he searched every club sign-up sheet, every sports roster, even spent hours in the library going over previous yearbooks looking for the name. But Kurt Hummel wasn't a student at Madison.

Later Blaine was positive he'd find Kurt at Dalton Academy. Dalton was his haven from bullying and homophobia and surely it was for other boys as well, Kurt included. But while he was there Dalton remained entirely Kurt-less.

He tried internet searches and even visited some "Find Your Soulmate" sites, to no avail. For a while he told himself it was because he'd been marked so early. Even if Kurt was a year or two older, it was absolutely possible that he just hadn't been marked yet. But eventually even that hope faded.

While reality was disappointing him, Blaine's fantasy life kept getting darker and richer. By the time he was doing his undergraduate work at OSU he always masturbated while kneeling, completely naked, on the hard floor of his tiny apartment. In his head Kurt was behind him, whispering instructions in his ear and making him edge himself over and over as he pleaded out loud to the empty room.

"Please. Please Kurt. I need it."

_Not yet, baby. You can take more. I know you can. Just a few more times._

And he'd stroke slower, dragging it out until he was aching with frustration and begging for release.

"Please. I've been so good. It's too much, Kurt. Please."

When he knew he couldn't take it any longer, when his knees were aching and tears were starting in his eyes, the Kurt in his head would finally relent.

_So good, baby. I'm so proud of you. Five more strokes and you can come, Blaine. Long and slow, though. Show me what a perfect sub I have._

He'd draw out those last five strokes until he was practically sobbing, panting through his need.

"Thank you! God, thank you Kurt . . ."

His orgasm would rush through him like a tornado, shattering his body as he came in long, tearing spurts onto the weathered floorboards. He could almost feel Kurt's arms tighten around him from behind, holding him together when the pleasure threatened to rip him apart. And later, after he'd cleaned up and crawled into bed, he would pretend Kurt was there with him. Wrapping him up in a warm, strong embrace. Cradling Blaine's head on his broad chest. Murmuring beautiful words in his ear.

At college Blaine had attended every mixer, every rush party, introducing himself to as many men as he could. As soon as he was of age he went out every weekend, to club after club, searching. He would meet doms, go out with them, play with them sometimes. He needed to be dominated. He needed to be pushed. He told himself he was practicing. Getting ready. He never went out with the same man more than once.

They had told him in sub class, right after he'd been marked, how important it was not to get so caught up in the idea of your soulmate that you let life pass you by. The time of meeting, just like the name itself, was decided by fate; soulmates found each other when they were meant to and not before. But that didn't stop Blaine from looking and from pretending that every man he slept with was his Kurt. He dragged his fantasies from OSU to the much richer pastures of New York University. He refused to give up hope.

There were times when Blaine resented Kurt Hummel for not putting in an appearance sooner. He wasn't supposed to be exploring the depths of his submission all on his own. He needed his soulmate. It was Kurt's job to push him further, take him deeper than he thought he could go and Blaine longed for the day that would happen. In the meantime, if they had to wait for each other, Blaine was going to make sure he was worth it. He would make himself as perfect as possible. Obedient. Controlled. So when Kurt finally claimed him he would be ready to fulfill whatever dark fantasies his dom had been jerking off to all these years.

He couldn't keep it up forever, though. The end came one night during his last year of graduate work at NYU, when he found himself kneeling on a bed, hands tied to the headboard, taking a vigorous paddling from some guy he wasn't remotely attracted to. He'd only gone home with him because the guy's name was Curt and Blaine couldn't resist the opportunity to actually call out his soulmate's name. Kneeling there, with his ass stinging and the sweaty Curt grunting with effort above him, not turned on in the slightest, Blaine suddenly realized that he was spending so much of his life looking for, waiting for Kurt that he wasn't actually living it. It could be years before Kurt appeared. He'd enslaved himself to a fantasy and it was making him miserable. To sweaty Curt's horror, he'd collapsed in desperate sobs mid-scene.

Of course, he'd safeworded, and sweaty Curt had turned out to be a pretty nice guy who kept his head together and talked Blaine through calming down, getting dressed, and getting a cab home.

Blaine knew he had to make some changes. It was time to stop chasing a fantasy. It was time to figure out who he was and what he wanted, instead of waiting for Kurt to figure those things out for him. The following Monday he'd called his advisor to talk about deferring his post-graduate admission (when had he decided he wanted to be a college professor anyhow?) and started making new plans. He'd go back to Ohio for a while. He just needed time to let things go. He had enough credit toward a teaching credential that he could register as a substitute and spend some time not thinking. Letting go of Kurt once and for all. Accepting that maybe in his case fate had made a mistake.


	2. Chapter Two

"Noah! Leave it alone! I'm not telling you the name. You're not even supposed to ask me."

Kurt had had his cuff for a few weeks now, but the novelty still hadn't worn off for his friends. Puckerman had been bugging him since day one about his name, and he was using the fact that Dr. Fletcher was late for history – again – to bring it up – again.

"Dude, I just want to know if it's a guy." Puck leaned past Jenn Gibbs to get in Kurt's face.

Kurt turned an astonished glare on him. "Is that seriously what this is about?"

"Well, yeah. You're the only gay dude I know. I want to know how that works!"

Kurt sighed and wished for the millionth time that he'd gotten his mark at the same time everyone else had. This time last year it had seemed like new cuffs appeared a couple of times a week. The latest mark-ee could enjoy being the center of attention for a few days then pass the honor to the next person before things got too annoying. Being the last meant that there wasn't anyone else to absorb some of the curiosity. It had been fun at first, but now the constant attention was starting to get old.

"Yes, Noah. I'm gay. My soulmate is a boy. It's not that hard to follow."

"I get it, Hummel. I'm just trying to . . ."

But before Kurt could discover Puck's ultimate goal, a commotion at the classroom door drew everyone's attention. Rachel Berry was making an even more dramatic entrance than usual.

"Guess what I just overheard in Principal Figgins' office?!" she announced to the room at large. When no one responded to her teaser she simply flung her arms wide in an even grander gesture and increased her volume until her voice echoed through the room. "Dr. Fletcher is GONE!" She held her pose for a moment, until she was sure she had everyone's attention, then in a patented leave-'em-wanting-more move, dropped her arms and her dramatic expression and slipped through the desks to fall into the empty chair next to Kurt and begin pulling things out of her bag.

Everyone started talking at once. Rachel didn't look up from her unpacking, but her smile said she'd accomplished exactly what she'd intended.

"What do you mean, gone?" Kurt asked her, because loath as he was to feed Rachel's need for attention, a disappearing teacher was definitely an item of interest. Plus he was kind of grateful to her for distracting Puck's attention from him.

"I mean," she replied without looking up from her work organizing book, papers and writing instruments in perfect preparation for the history lesson, "gone. As in never coming back to McKinley High."

She was obviously still holding back juicy details, so Kurt put on his best wheedling voice. "And why is he never to grace the hallowed halls again?"

Rachel had worn a cuff on her left wrist since the summer before sophomore year. There was no way she could resist a pleading tone. As Kurt suspected, she finally looked up from her organizing and leaned in to whisper conspiratorially.

"I heard he tried to accost an unattached sub in the parking lot after school yesterday. And," her voice got even quieter and Kurt had to move closer to hear, "I heard the sub in question was Dave Karofsky."

That definitely got Rachel the reaction she was looking for. Kurt was genuinely stunned. Dr. Fletcher had always seemed so normal and calm. Kurt knew that things could be difficult for doms who were single too long, at least that's how television and movies made it seem, but could being alone too long really make a rational person suddenly assault a student? Especially one who was already having trouble adjusting to his sub status? It was enough to make Kurt feel sorry for Karofsky, which was a pretty tall order.

The dominant hormones in Kurt's body were only starting to show themselves, he knew, but still, he couldn't imagine being desperate and lonely enough to go around grabbing at unclaimed subs. The thought that any dom – that he – could possibly be reduced to that was kind of terrifying.

"Are you sure about this, Rachel? It's a pretty big accusation."

"I was in the office this morning when Principal Figgins was telling Miss Bates all about it. I have sort of superhuman hearing, you know." She waited for Kurt to acknowledge that but when he only stared at her, she continued. "Then she asked him how long the substitute would be staying – for the paperwork – and Principal Figgins said the rest of the year. Because, and I quote, 'There's no way we can have Paul around the students ever again.'"

She nodded her head with finality, as if this totally settled the matter. Kurt was about to point out that it did nothing of the sort when there was another disturbance at the door and a man, a slightly disheveled but, wow, gorgeous man, bustled into the room juggling papers, a briefcase, and a large travel mug of coffee. He barely glanced at the class in his rush to set everything down before he dropped something, but Kurt couldn't take his eyes off him. He leaned into Rachel, all thoughts of Dave Karofsky gone.

"Good lord, please let that be the sub!" he whispered.

"Apparently he's the sub sub," Rachel giggled, holding up her own bare right wrist.

"If he's the gay sub sub I might have to rethink my stance on the existence of God."

"Oh, no. I totally don't get a gay vibe. He's on my team. Definitely."

Kurt dragged his gaze away from the teacher, who seemed to be muttering to himself as he tried to organize his things, and raised an eyebrow at Rachel. "For someone who spends so much time with me, you have a tragic lack of gaydar."

Rachel arched an identical eyebrow back at him. "Straight people can wear bow ties too, you know."

At that moment the sub sub looked up from the desk and seemed to notice the room full of students for the first time. Kurt felt his senses prickle a bit as the teacher surveyed them with a sheepish smile. He was definitely beautiful to look at. How he managed that in a sweater vest and bow tie Kurt wasn't quite sure; the slightly chaotic curly hair and beyond huge golden brown eyes might have something to do with it.

"Sorry I'm late . . . paperwork . . ." He offered the room an apologetic grin. It occurred to Kurt that those liquid eyes and that smile would look amazing when focused up at a person from, say, his knees.

Okay. His first official dom thought. Everyone had told him he'd start having them, usually at random, inappropriate moments. Something that felt like arousal stirred in Kurt's belly, although he wasn't sure if it was from the mental picture of the pretty teacher on his knees or just from the fact that he'd actually had a dom thought. Next to him Rachel gave a tiny sigh and Kurt realized she was probably having the exact same dom thought. So much for arousal.

But the object of their fantasies was still talking.

"Sadly," he said, taking a sip from his ceramic mug, "it seems Dr. Fletcher won't be returning this year. I'm Mr. Anderson and I'll be your substitute until the district comes up with a permanent replacement."

A tiny gasp was the only thing that might have given Kurt's reaction away. Fortunately, Rachel's senses weren't actually superhuman, so she couldn't hear the way his heartbeat sped up at the word "Anderson." Which was ridiculous, really. Anderson was a very common name. There were five Andersons in the McKinley junior class alone. And Kurt had promised himself that he wouldn't ever have a repeat of last week, when he'd staked out the service desk at the local mall for a solid hour after "Mr. Anderson" had been paged to return there. Soulmates found each other when they were supposed to, Rachel kept reminding him, apparently with no stalking required. Besides, this Mr. Anderson was a grown man and while it wasn't unheard of for doms to be a great deal younger than their subs, it was fairly unusual. Of course, Kurt figured everything about his life was unusual.

Mr. Anderson was still talking, rifling through stacks of books and papers left willy-nilly on Dr. Fletcher's desk.

"If you'll all just give me a minute to get organized and find the attendance book, I'll take role and we can get started." He glanced up at them with a questioning look. Like he was asking for approval. Like he was asking for permission_._

A voice in Kurt's head spoke, plain as Rachel had been in his ear.

_You have 45 seconds - no longer. Don't make me wait._

Well crap. Were dom thoughts supposed to be so . . . specific? Or was he just reacting more strongly because the teacher's name was Anderson? And why did he feel so annoyed when Mr. Anderson went back to searching the desk without being granted the permission he had so obviously, if unconsciously, been looking for?

Kurt glanced at Rachel but she was absorbed in her pencils at the moment. So she hadn't reacted to the whole permission-asking thing, then. He'd ask her about it at lunch. Oddly, Rachel had become his go-to dom for questions about what was normal. And even more oddly, she always seemed to be able to make him feel better about his struggles with the new thoughts and feelings taking over his body.

A light tapping drew everyone's attention to the door for a third time, where Mrs. Dixon, the elderly French teacher, was smiling and waving a piece of paper.

"I think you dropped something, dear." She fluttered the paper in Mr. Anderson's direction and he smiled at her as he made his way around the desk to the door. Immediately a murmur of voices swelled through the room as everyone started chatting the way students always do when their teacher's attention is elsewhere. Kurt took the opportunity to stare openly at Mr. Anderson's ass, which was really quite remarkable. Hormones, he told himself. A person had to give in to them occasionally.

He could hear snippets of the teachers' conversation over the general noise in the room, but really, the ass was much more interesting. Until Mrs. Dixon held out her hand, clearly introducing herself, and Mr. Anderson did the same.

Kurt stopped breathing.

The room was noisy and their voices were low but it sounded like, he could have sworn that the drop-dead gorgeous sub sub had just introduced himself as Blaine Anderson.

Which was impossible and clearly Kurt's dom hormones were inducing more auditory hallucinations. The classroom was noisy. He'd misheard. He was having some kind of waking fantasy.

The two teachers were still chatting quietly and Kurt reached blindly for Rachel without taking his eyes off of them.

"Rachel!" God, why was his voice shaking?

"Hey, are you okay?"

"To be determined. I need your bionic ears. What did Mr. Anderson just say his first name was?"

Rachel thought for a moment. "I wasn't really listening, you know. Ummm, Blake? Or Blair maybe? Definitely something with a bl."

Blair, Kurt thought. It had to be Blair. Because no one got their mark then three weeks later met their soulmate, who happened to be a stunningly beautiful full-grown adult, before they'd even had the chance to take one dom class. Life just didn't work that way.

Except Mr. Anderson was making his way back to his desk, new paper in hand, so the class was starting to quiet down and Mrs. Dixon was still speaking.

"Well, welcome to McKinley, Blaine. Don't let these creatures give you too much trouble." And with another quick smile she was gone.

And the bottom fell out of Kurt's brain.


	3. Chapter Three

It was possible, totally possible, Kurt told his out-of-control heart, that this Blaine Anderson wasn't the Blaine Anderson whose name was etched into his skin at all. Possible, and likely, really, so he should get over himself and remember how to breathe. Because there was no way Kurt lived in a world where someone that beautiful – with that ass – could possibly belong to him. Things like that just didn't happen to Kurt Hummel.

Oh God. Kurt Hummel. Mr. Anderson was even now searching for the attendance book. When he found it he'd open it and read down and see Kurt's name. Even if he had some kind of reaction that he couldn't control, Kurt wouldn't know if it was due to the name Kurt Hummel or because he'd gone to college with Jenn Gibbs' older sister or used to babysit Kelly Rodinsky. And Kurt needed to know if he was right. Because there was no way on earth he was going to approach Mr. Anderson unless he was sure. Without thinking any further, Kurt jumped to his feet and shot his hand into the air.

"Excuse me, Mr. Anderson?"

The golden eyes looked up from the mess on Dr. Fletcher's desk and landed for the first time on Kurt. He held his breath, waiting for a reaction. It was probably completely his imagination, but he could have sworn the gaze softened, warmed, as Mr. Anderson looked at him. Like his teacher found him attractive. Impossible.

"Yes . . . ?" Mr. Anderson paused as if he was waiting for Kurt to fill in his name. So Kurt did.

"Kurt. I'm Kurt Hummel."

And there it was. Mr. Anderson went absolutely still. His lips parted the tiniest bit. His eyes widened just enough; his throat worked in one convulsive swallow. Oh, he was good. Signs flashed into life and then were hidden so quickly that Kurt was sure no one else noticed them. But in that first frozen microsecond of the rest of his life, Kurt knew beyond a shadow of a doubt. He saw every tiny signal. Because he was attuned to them. Because Mr. Anderson was . . . holy crap. Was his sub. His soulmate.

They stood for a split-second of eternity with their eyes locked, Kurt knowing and Mr. Anderson knowing that he knew. Then just when Kurt was sure he was going to do something stupid like jump over the desk and shove his sub . . . _his sub_ . . . up against the white board, Mr. Anderson broke the gaze and pretended to search for the attendance book again.

"Did you have a question, Kurt?" he asked without looking up. But the tiniest flush spread over his face and down his neck when he spoke Kurt's name.

Crap. He didn't have a question. Not an appropriate one, anyhow. Improvise. "Um . . . well, I was wondering if you're going to be following Dr. Fletcher's syllabus while you're here, or will you be, um, changing things?"

Mr. Anderson looked up again to meet Kurt's gaze. Kurt stared right back, hoping he looked strong and in control. Challenging.

"I . . . I thought I'd stick with the syllabus mostly. With maybe occasional departures if it seems warranted?"

Oh God. It was a question. He'd most definitely made it a question. And now he kept his lovely eyes on Kurt while he waited for the answer.

"Okay. Good." Kurt was very proud of himself for keeping his voice steady, because absolutely nothing else was. Especially when Mr. Anderson's eyes lowered to the desk in obvious acknowledgement and the flush on his cheeks deepened.

People were starting to stare at Kurt, and Rachel poked him and mouthed a silent "what's up?" but he just shook his head at her and took his seat again. Mr. Anderson had resumed shoving things around on Dr. Fletcher's desk, but it was obvious he had given up even the pretense of actually looking for anything. His hands moved faster and faster and for a second Kurt thought he was going to just sweep everything onto the floor. Instead, he suddenly froze completely, still staring down at the desk where any semblance of order had been destroyed. In a short, abrupt move he shook his head once, hard, and then looked up at the clock on the back wall.

"I can't seem to find the attendance book," he told the clock in a careful, precise voice, "so I should head to the office and see if they can print me a roster."

"You know we could just tell you who's not here," Puck offered helpfully. Mr. Anderson's eyes flickered to him briefly, then back to the clock.

"No, I want to get things right on my first day. Everyone read your next chapter until I get back." He practically ran out the door.

Conversation in the room picked up again and only a few students actually opened their books. Kurt wasn't one of them. Kurt couldn't even remember which book he was supposed to be reading.

There was a war going on in Kurt's head. On the one hand, his dom brain, completely beyond his control now, was conjuring up images that made his earlier thoughts seem like child's play. Mr. Anderson on his knees again – naked this time. Mr. Anderson looking up at him with those golden eyes, pleading, begging for things that Kurt didn't even have words to articulate. Spread out on a bed, hands cuffed over his head, body straining . . . Kurt had to curl his hands around the edge of his chair to resist the urge to go chase down his sub and mark him in some wildly inappropriate way.

While his dom hormones were roaring like lions, the teenage virgin in the other half of his brain was quietly having a breakdown. Mr. Anderson was a full-grown adult. Mr. Anderson had been to college and lived on his own. Unless there was something seriously wrong with him, Mr. Anderson had had sexual relationships and played with other doms. Mr. Anderson – and dear God, he really had to stop calling him Mr. Anderson in his head – _Blaine_ was probably (_certainly_) expecting a grown-up, experienced soulmate and he was getting a sixteen-year-old who'd only had his mark for three weeks and hadn't even taken a dom class. It was the emotional equivalent of a five-year-old trying to walk a Rottweiler.

Kurt let his head fall onto his desk with a thump. When he'd fantasized about meeting his soulmate for the first time, abject terror had never been part of the equation.

"Dude! You okay?" Puck was leaning past Jenn Gibbs again to poke Kurt's shoulder. Kurt lifted his head and saw that he had Rachel's attention as well.

"Okay, what is up between you and Mr. Anderson? And don't tell me nothing because you look like you're about to pass out."

Kurt looked from one to another, trying to think up an excuse for his distress. "Dom thoughts," he finally muttered. Best to stick as close to the truth as possible.

Rachel patted his arm, nodding her head in solidarity. Puck gave a sympathetic groan. "I have so been there, bro. The other day in Glee club, when Brittany was sort of wrapping that mic cord around her wrist? Man, took everything I had not to . . ."

"Not helping, Noah!" Kurt snapped.

"Oh. Well, sorry dude." Puck leaned back into his own space and Kurt tried to smile apologetically at Jenn, who was looking more and more put out. Rachel patted Kurt's arm, drawing soothing little circles on his skin.

"It won't be like this forever, you know. It's just because your mark is new. Pretty soon you'll hardly even notice it."

"Puckerman's had his cuff for two years and look how he acts!"

"Yes, but Noah's a deviant sex fiend."

"Good point," Kurt acknowledged with a grateful smile.

Rachel smiled back. "Seriously, Kurt. After the initial adjustment you really only have those intense feelings about a lover. Or your soulmate."

Kurt sighed. He knew Rachel meant to be helpful. It wasn't her fault that she'd managed to say exactly the wrong thing. What he really wanted to ask her was, how the hell do you claim a sub who happens to be your history teacher? Nothing he'd ever read or heard or seen on TV covered a situation like this. None of his friends had found their soulmates yet. In fact, the Glee Club drama these days all centered on the fact that none of the dating couples seemed to _be_ soulmates. Tina and Mike were still dating, despite the fact that they were both doms. Finn was a sub, but since he hadn't traded his brown cuff for the black one that subs in a soulmate claim wore, everyone figured that, whatever else they may be doing, he and Rachel weren't a fated pair. And the strange dance Santana and Brittany had been doing around each other for the past year had ended when Britt's mark appeared, even though Santana was a dom and Brittany was a sub.

On the whole, Kurt figured no one wanted to deal with his anxiety about meeting his gorgeous, sexy, experienced soulmate three weeks after getting his mark.

Okay. The second best thing to Rachel Berry when it came to information was the school library. Kurt opened his textbook and searched out the appropriate chapter. That was it. Lunch was next and he'd spend it in the library cramming on dom/sub relations. He'd figure out what was expected of him, make a plan, and after school he'd track down his sub – oh God, his sub! - and do . . . . whatever doms were supposed to do. Meanwhile, if he wanted to pass history he needed to start concentrating on the Victorians. He was pretty sure it was illegal for doms to command their subs to do anything unethical, and preferential grading almost certainly counted as unethical.

Unfortunately for his plans to actually absorb some knowledge, Mr. – _Blaine_ – Blaine returned after just a few more minutes. He clearly hadn't been to the office. He had no attendance sheet, his bow tie was slightly askew, and his face had the raw, shiny look of having been freshly scrubbed. He managed to actually look at the students this time, although his eyes never strayed anywhere near Kurt.

"Um, if everyone would finish the chapter then please start on the review questions? Whatever you don't finish you can take as homework." With careful, controlled movements Blaine pulled out the desk chair, sat, opened a book apparently at random from those scattered over the desk, and stared at it.

Now that Kurt had a plan and wasn't feeling like he was about to faint from surprise, he was able to sit and take in the man destiny had chosen for him. It was kind of overwhelming how beautiful Blaine was. Not just the eyes – although they were certainly a highlight. He had the most delicious mouth. Full pink lips, the top one curved in a perfect bow shape. His jaw was strong and masculine. The shirt he was wearing gave a hint of biceps under the sleeves and the shapes hidden there actually made Kurt's mouth water. His hands were pretty too. Long fingers that kept surreptitiously touching the cuff on his right wrist as he pretended to read the book in front of him. Kurt couldn't help imagining the letters of his own name burned into the skin under that cuff. It felt so intimate. It felt wrong to even know that his name was there, carved in Blaine's flesh, while he sat surrounded by oblivious students. To know that Blaine was thinking about the exact same thing. New feelings were exploding through his body with Blaine's every twitch.

Kurt stared at him, willing him to look up. But either the idea of a supernatural connection between soulmates was complete hogwash or Blaine was very good at resisting because his eyes stayed firmly on the book in front of him. He didn't even look up when the bell finally rang. "Remember, answers to the review questions tomorrow," he told the book as students jumped up from their seats and headed en masse out the door.

Kurt hung back a bit until most of the class had gone, wondering if he should just walk up to the desk, maybe make a little joke to break the ice. Traditionally, he knew, doms approached subs first, but Blaine must realize how clueless he was. Shouldn't he take pity on Kurt and maybe lead the way a little?

No, Kurt decided, gathering up his things and sweeping toward the door in Rachel's wake. Library first. He needed to figure out how to do this right. After all, you only got one claiming with your soulmate. He didn't want to screw it up.

Blaine's eyes stayed down as Kurt passed the desk, and only the hand rubbing nervously at his cuff gave anything away.


	4. Chapter Four

"I'm Kurt Hummel."

Just like that. Thirteen years and countless parties, clubs and one-night stands, a dramatic retreat, months of soul-searching, finally coming to terms with this new soulmate-less reality, and a boy – a beautiful boy with eyes the color of the sky after the rain stops but before the sun comes out – aboy stood up from a gaggle of pimply-faced teenagers on an ordinary March morning and stopped time.

And Blaine, after one look in the eyes of his long-awaited soulmate, had run away.

Even now, huddled in the tiny, windowless office that was obviously a converted janitor's closet, he was running. He had sleepwalked through the rest of his classes, torn between the need to find Kurt and fall down at his feet and the desire to hide under the desk until everyone went home and he could make his getaway. Hiding had won, and now he sat behind his locked door and struggled just to breathe normally. His brain seemed to be broken in half and he couldn't figure out how to get the pieces back together.

It was a joke, really. It had to be. A huge cosmic joke that the universe was playing on him. How else could he explain the fact that the destined love of his life, his soulmate and dom, was a junior in high school who looked like he couldn't dominate a fly?

The idea of touching Kurt, of wanting Kurt to touch him (and God, he did) should feel creepy. The kid couldn't be more than seventeen. The idea of submitting to him was ludicrous. Blaine couldn't reconcile the real Kurt with the fantasy Kurt who had lived in his head for so long. His Kurt, the Kurt he needed, with his broad shoulders and arms strong enough to catch and hold Blaine when his legs gave out from an overload of pain or pleasure. This Kurt, long and lean, was beautiful but not strong in the way Blaine dreamt of. Although he was young; he probably still had some growing to do. And Jesus Christ, that was not the thought you wanted to be having about the person who was supposed to help you find new depths of obedience and sexual submission. _Maybe he'll be buff when he grows up._

Blaine sagged in the chair behind his little desk and stared at the books lined up on the tiny bookshelf, left behind by the room's previous occupant. What the hell was he supposed to do now? For years he'd worked to shape himself into the perfect submissive. He'd played with strict, aggressive doms and pushed himself in any way he could think of. He'd practiced half his life so that he would be everything his Kurt deserved from a sub. He knew his desire for submission was deeper than he'd even really admitted to himself – certainly deeper than he'd shown any of the doms he'd played with. No one had ever been able to completely fulfill him, but he'd always believed that was because no one was Kurt Hummel. His soulmate would be the one person who would understand his darkest desires, push him far enough, take him apart and break him down and then piece him back together better than before.

There was simply no way Kurt Hummel, for all his long-limbed, stormy-eyed beauty, was the man (boy – the _boy_) who could do those things. All of Blaine's work and self-training and still the universe apparently didn't think he deserved a real dom. Maybe it wasn't even worth it. Maybe he'd be happier with his fantasies.

But there had been nights, there still were, during his long wait, when Blaine would wake up shivering, aching with his longing for Kurt. The real Kurt. For real arms to hold him and a real voice to tell him how perfect he was. He would cry, sometimes, with how desperately he wanted to find that one man his heart would recognize as its destined mate. He'd known then, as he knew now, that he needed Kurt. That he wouldn't be whole until he found him. And Kurt was _here_, and real and absolutely nothing Blaine had expected. But no matter how much his mind rebelled Blaine could feel his body's pull toward the boy. His body wanted its master. It wanted to kneel and submit and obey.

So, stuck between the fear in his brain and the need in his body, Blaine waited - _hid_, he told himself, _at least be honest about what you're doing_ – in the tiny office until he was sure that Kurt would have left campus. Then he started to gather up his things and put his bag in order. He was just picking up his phone when four sharp raps on the door split the silence and startled him so badly that the phone slipped from his fingers and clattered back onto the desk.

He knew it would be Kurt. And when he wrenched the door open, a little too hard thanks to nerves and maybe some attempt at bravado, Kurt indeed stood there, tall, beautiful, looking determined and maybe a little scared, holding up his very bare left arm so that Blaine came face to face with the name traced out in red welts on Kurt's wrist.

Blaine Anderson.

Just being so close to Kurt, so suddenly, was overwhelming, but to see those letters, bright red and obviously recent, spelling out the inevitability of his situation; Blaine couldn't move. He couldn't find the voice to say any of the words that custom or courtesy demanded. He just stood in silence, looking from Kurt's eyes to his bare wrist. It was shockingly intimate, seeing his name there. In his whole life Blaine had never seen anyone's mark but his own. It made Kurt seem so exposed and that, added to the natural submission he felt being near his soulmate, threatened to make him forget every objection his brain had raised and just fall to his knees at Kurt's feet.

Instead, he stepped back so that Kurt could come into the office. But he couldn't help lowering his eyes to the floor. He watched Kurt's feet, in black tennis shoes below artfully distressed denim, as he moved into the room, then turned and closed the door. The sound of the lock clicking into place seemed to slam into his body. Kurt's feet turned back, his messenger bag dropped to the floor by the door, and then Blaine could feel those eyes on him again. For a long time he was silent.

"Look at me, Blaine," Kurt said finally, in his high, soft voice.

Blaine raised his eyes to meet Kurt's intense blue gaze.

"Take off your cuff," Kurt ordered. It was the traditional command from a dom to a sub he suspected was his soulmate. Blaine had dreamed of the moment a dom would look at him with this kind of intensity and make that demand. Somehow, perhaps because Kurt had ordered him to look up, he couldn't seem to pull his eyes away so his fingers fumbled at the clasp blindly. He managed to loosen it without any help from his eyes and slid the cuff off his arm. Then he held it up as Kurt had done, so the boy could read his own name on Blaine's wrist, in letters that had long since faded to silvery scars.

* * *

><p>For a very long moment Kurt couldn't move – couldn't think, really. He could only stare at the name, his name, etched in scarred lines below Blaine's open, slightly trembling, palm. He'd been sure since that first moment in history class, but now, seeing the mark, the full force of it hit him square in the chest. Like someone had reached right into his body and wrapped a fist around his heart.<p>

He'd had a plan. After his excruciatingly embarrassing conversation with Mrs. Jenkins in the library, which had somehow resulted in a copy of "Domming for Dummies," of all things, in his bag, he'd tried to at least glean a little wisdom from the book. His surreptitious glances during afternoon classes had left him more confused than anything. If he'd hoped to get any step-by-step claiming instructions he was sorely disappointed. It apparently wasn't one-size-fits-all, but seemed to be anything from a formal dinner date to outright, up-against-a-wall sex. The only thing that had really stood out to him were three items from a list of qualities subs needed from their doms: a strong, controlled presence, open, honest communication, and lots of physical affection. So that was his big plan. Strong and controlled, honest communication, affection.

Now, standing inches from his newfound sub in the tiny office, Kurt really, really hoped honest communication would be enough. Because strong and controlled had left the moment Blaine had opened the door and physical affection, no matter how enticing those curls were, seemed about as likely as Coach Sylvester taking a vow of chastity and joining a convent.

When the silence between them had dragged on far too long and Kurt was just starting to accept that he was supposed to speak first, Blaine surprised him.

"I'm sorry," he said, as if it should be obvious what he was sorry for. "I know I should have come to you. I was going to. I just needed some time to get used to the idea."

The hand on Kurt's heart tightened, and not in a good way. "The idea of having me for your soulmate?" he asked, but he already knew the answer.

"The idea of having a seventeen-year-old student for my dom," Blaine said, again as if it should have been completely obvious.

Even hope was failing Kurt now. Honesty was the only ally he had.

"Sixteen."

"What?"

It wasn't quite clear if Blaine's question was from shock or because he actually hadn't heard. "I'm sixteen," Kurt repeated.

"Oh my God." Blaine ran a hand through his hair, clutching at it like it was some sort of lifeline.

"I'll be seventeen in May," Kurt offered.

Blaine was doing his best to pace now, but in the tiny space it ended up being more like very jerky twirling. "This is a nightmare," he said in a soft voice. "Oh God. I'm sorry. I shouldn't be saying any of this to you."

Kurt leapt at the opportunity to get back to his plan. "No," he said firmly. "I want you to be honest with me. I get that this is weird and if we can't be honest with each other we don't stand a chance. I want you to tell me what you're thinking and feeling."

Blaine stopped and stared at Kurt. "Really?"

Strong. Controlling. Honest. "Absolutely."

It was like someone flipped a switch on Blaine. All his fidgeting stopped. He planted his feet, arms going still at his sides, and looked Kurt straight in the eye. It must have been the command, Kurt figured. He was actually feeling a little proud of himself for finding a way to calm Blaine down. Until Blaine spoke.

"Honestly?" He skewered Kurt with his golden-brown eyes. "I'm pissed off. I am so fucking angry – you have no idea."

Kurt fumbled for a response. "This . . . was a surprise to me too."

"Really? How long have you had that mark? A few months?"

"Three weeks, actually."

"Three wee . . ." Blaine turned his back on Kurt completely, like he couldn't bear to look at him, and clutched at the edge of the little desk. "Of course. Have you even taken a dom class?"

"I start next Wednesday."

"Of course you do," Blaine said with a laugh that cut like broken glass.

Kurt knew this was all wrong. He was losing even his illusion of control of the situation. Blaine's whole demeanor had changed. He turned to Kurt so swiftly that it almost felt like an attack. He held up his marked wrist; waved it in Kurt's face. "I got this when I was thirteen. For almost fourteen years I've been staring at that name." He punctuated his words with little thrusts of his wrist. "Waiting for him. Wondering about him. Fucking fantasizing about him."

"About me." Kurt tried to speak with authority but it came out as little more than a squeak.

"No. _Him_." Blaine shoved his wrist closer to Kurt's face. "Because when I was jerking off pretending _he_ was telling me what to do and when to come, _you_ were probably still in diapers!"

Oh God. Blaine was losing control and it was all Kurt's fault. He'd commanded Blaine to be honest, to say what was on his mind, and now like the sorcerer's apprentice he was drowning in the emotions that he'd accidentally set free. He had to find a way to help Blaine get back under control. It was his job. If only he had any clue how to do it.

"Okay, that's enough," he attempted.

"No! You don't get it. You can't. Have you even had sex?!" Blaine's voice was now loud enough that Kurt could only hope everyone had already vacated the halls outside the door.

"No . . ."

"Every man I've ever been with I pretended was him. All those years, I _practiced_. I practiced for him. So I could be everything he deserved."

"Blaine . . ." Kurt tried so hard to sound commanding.

"I called them all Master – not because it was hot but so I didn't have to be reminded that they weren't him. But after all that I still for some reason don't deserve a real dom." Blaine's voice was shaking now, his whole body was shaking.

"Okay, you need to calm down." Would it sound more like an order if he pretended very hard to himself that it was one?

"No, you told me to be honest and I am _nothing_ if not obedient. What I need is to give up these stupid ideas about soulmates and perfect doms and start living in the real world. Which is what I thought I was doing until you showed up."

"Blaine!" Maybe if he shouted too . . .

"So why don't you just run home and tell your mommy how awful your sub turned out to be and she can . . ."

Kurt didn't even think. His hand shot out, lightning fast, and grabbed Blaine by the jaw, forcing him to look directly into Kurt's eyes.

"On your knees_. Now_."

He didn't shout. He didn't even really think of it as a command. But when he loosened his grip Blaine couldn't have hit the floor faster if gravity had suddenly tripled.

* * *

><p>Falling to his knees was pure instinct. Blaine was on the floor before he even fully registered Kurt's order. His body was still trembling with the emotion of his outburst, but it all felt restrained, strangely anchored by the phantom sensation of Kurt's hand gripping his jaw and the implacability of the command ringing in his ears.<p>

Kurt stood straight and tall above him and Blaine could tell he was angry. Maybe even furious.

"Show me your arm." Kurt had been all hesitation before, trying to placate Blaine, but now that was gone. He was taking control and disobedience wasn't even an option. Blaine held out his right wrist.

Kurt leaned down a little to place his own left wrist next to Blaine's. "Look at them," he ordered, and Blaine raised his eyes to look at their two arms side by side, one darker, one fair, with their names written in flesh.

"What do they mean?" Kurt asked.

"That we're soulmates." Blaine hated how unsteady his voice sounded. Kurt's breathing and his own heartbeat pounding seemed unnaturally loud in the tiny room.

The pale arm was snatched away and Blaine lowered his eyes to the floor once more. Anger was still radiating off Kurt, even with his back turned, and curious as he was, Blaine didn't quite dare look up to see what he was doing. He jumped and had to bite back a yelp when a huge book slammed to the floor just in front of his knees. Blaine read the cover without really understanding it. _Merriam-Webster Dictionary of the English Language_.

"Look it up," came the command, and Blaine didn't have to ask what. He rifled to the S section, spread the book open, and waited for the next order.

"Read it out loud."

It should have felt humiliating. His teenaged, student dom was making him define words like a disobedient seven-year-old. But this was familiar - knowing that all he had to do was follow instructions. Blaine's breathing was calming and his voice no longer shook as he started.

"Soulmate. Noun. Singular. From the Latin . . ."

"Just the definition."

He bit back an impulse to apologize. "1. A given person's perfect emotional, physical and intellectual match, as signified by the appearance of a name on the skin of one's wrist, usually some time during the adolescent phase. 2. The love of one's life."

"Again."

Blaine's chest tightened with some emotion he couldn't name, and his voice trembled again just a bit as he read, "1. A given person's perfect emotional, physical and intellectual match, as signified by the appearance of a name on the skin of one's wrist, usually some time during the adolescent phase. 2. The love of one's life."

And suddenly, a sweep of his foot sending the book across the floor, Kurt was there, on the floor with him, closer than he'd been yet, gripping Blaine's jaw again and forcing his gaze back up. And while Kurt's voice had been cold and distant, his eyes were open, concerned, questioning.

"Are you really willing to give all that up just because I'm younger than you?"

He was so close. Blaine could smell the warmth of his skin, with some lingering scent of – body wash? Cologne? The room suddenly seemed bigger, walls receding away from him, and the face in front of him was starting to feel like the only real thing in the world. He had to swallow past a lump forming in his throat before he could speak. "I just . . ."

"My mother died when I was eight."

Shit. "Oh my God, I'm so . . ."

"And ever since it became clear that I wasn't going to swing the same way as the other boys, I've been pretty much tortured every single day. And you know what got me through? This." He held up his wrist again so Blaine could read his name. "Even before the mark came, knowing that it would. That there was someone out there, my perfect match. That someday someone would come along who would just get me. Who would love all the things about me that everyone else was trying to tell me I should be ashamed of."

Kurt's hand dropped from his jaw, but Blaine kept his head up, staring into blue eyes that radiated sincerity and sadness.

"You aren't what I expected either, Blaine. I expected someone like me. I expected coffee dates and Glee Club duets, and someone who could share all his firsts with me. The way you look at me – the things you want from me – they terrify me. But I believe that I can give them to you, as impossible as that seems, because this," he grabbed Blaine's arm and lifted it against his own so their marks were side-by-side again, "this says I can. This says I'm the _only_ one who can. And I trust that."

Blaine sat in silence for a long time, looking from Kurt's eyes to their marks and back again. He suddenly wanted so much to make Kurt happy. To give him the answer he was asking for. But Kurt had told him to be honest and Blaine found that now, with Kurt so close, long fingers wrapped around Blaine's wrist, he wanted to be honest too. Kurt had said it was their only chance.

"I don't know if I can."

Kurt didn't even look disappointed. He actually smiled a little, lopsided smile.

"Trust fate?" he asked. "Or me?"

"Both."

And like a little miracle, Kurt's fingers came back to Blaine's face, but this time they were gentle, his thumb tracing a caress from the point of Blaine's chin back along his jaw line. Maybe it was the closeness or the release of kneeling so quietly after his outburst, but the thumb seemed to be drawing a line of pure desire along Blaine's cheek. Worry and fear faded and he felt like he could be happy kneeling there forever, as long as Kurt kept touching him.

But then Kurt's eyes darkened and he leaned even closer and almost before Blaine could register what was happening he pressed his lips to Blaine's in a soft, gentle kiss.

Everyone said it was different with your soulmate, and they were right. The simple, light pressure of Kurt's lips seemed to pin Blaine to the floor. His eyes fluttered closed and his lips parted – an invitation to deepen the kiss – but Kurt wouldn't be led. Instead he slowly caressed first Blaine's top lip then his bottom with his own, and then pulled back with a soft sigh. When Blaine opened his eyes he found Kurt's, so close, but completely unreadable.

"What was that for?" he couldn't help asking.

"For honesty. And for being so obedient."

Blaine felt his eyebrows go up in surprise, which made Kurt smile.

"That was my first kiss, by the way. First real kiss, anyway." He pulled back a little further and Blaine began to feel like he could breathe again. "We're both going to sleep on this tonight and I'll meet you back here before school tomorrow. We'll keep this to ourselves for now. Until we figure things out. Okay?"

Blaine nodded. Kurt didn't get up from the floor, though. For a long moment he just stared at Blaine. Finally, the lopsided smile came back.

"Put your hands behind your back."

It struck Blaine that this was the first unselfconscious order Kurt had given him. When he'd first come into the room he'd been playing at commanding. Then when he was angry he'd been acting on instinct. But this time Kurt had looked at him, considered what he wanted, and ordered Blaine to do it, without even questioning if he'd be obeyed. His hands were clasped behind his back before he finished the thought.

Kurt leaned forward again. This time their lips barely touched, but Kurt's tongue slipped past Blaine's parted lips and brushed fleetingly against the tip of his, once, twice, it was subtly coffee-flavored and achingly sweet, and then Kurt was moving away again and a tiny whimper escaped Blaine's throat as he leaned forward, chasing the taste. Begging for more.

He could have sworn Kurt giggled just a little, but he got up and moved past Blaine to the desk. Blaine didn't open his eyes, but he could hear Kurt fiddle with something, and then a tiny trill of harp strings came from somewhere – Kurt's bag? He felt a hand drop softly onto his head and long fingers caress though his hair.

"Goodnight Blaine."

Blaine kept his eyes closed, trying to hold on to the feeling of simple contentment Kurt's kiss and touch had brought him. He didn't open them again until he heard the door open and close and he was alone once more.


	5. Chapter Five

"Cock!"

Kurt watched in his vanity mirror as a dark red flush crept up his neck and across his cheeks. God. He was hopeless.

"Cock!"

He was still trying to wrap his brain around what had happened in Blaine's office that afternoon. It was kind of a blur of yelling (first Blaine's, then his) and kissing and heat and arousal. There was only one moment that stood out crystal clear in his head.

_Put your hands behind your back._

"Cock!"

The blush spread across his face again and he scrubbed his cheeks with his hands as if he could wipe it away. "Domming for Dummies" had suggested practicing in a mirror if you were uncomfortable with something your partner wanted you to say or do during sex. But he couldn't even get the word "cock" out – when he was totally alone – without furious embarrassment. The idea of saying something like "suck my cock" to another person was beyond ridiculous. But he was pretty sure all the many men Blaine had talked about playing with had never had a problem with it.

He took a deep breath and faced the mirror again. He was a dom. He'd just had his sub on his knees following orders exactly. Never mind that he had no idea _how_ he'd actually achieved that. He could do this. Blaine needed it. Blaine deserved it.

"Cock!"

The thing was, he had no idea if he'd even managed to claim Blaine in some way as his sub. He'd definitely dominated him. And Blaine had submitted and obeyed, had followed Kurt's orders to the (completely thrilling) letter. And there had been kissing. Perfect, beautiful kissing. But he'd gone in expecting some kind of official acknowledgement and that definitely hadn't happened. Things kind of seemed even murkier now. God, could his life get any more complicated?

"Cock!"

"Hey Kurt. What's going on?"

Kurt spun away from the mirror so fast he almost fell off his chair, his heart doing its best to slam its way out of his chest. He hadn't expected anyone to be home for another full hour. He hadn't thought to lock himself in. But football practice must have finished early because Finn's head was poking around the door. He really just needed the floor to open up and swallow one of them whole. How come that never actually happened?

Finn stood there waiting for an answer and Kurt, after the emotional roller coaster of the day, didn't have anywhere near the energy to come up with a plausible lie.

"What's it look like, Finn?"

"It looks like you're staring at yourself in the mirror saying 'cock' over and over."

"Got it in one," Kurt muttered. He turned back toward the vanity and watched in the mirror as Finn took a few tentative steps into the room.

"Ooo-kay. Is there something really obvious going on here that I should be getting but I'm not so you're going to give me tons of crap for it later?"

Kurt sighed and dropped his chin onto his hands. "No Finn. I really am just staring at the mirror and saying 'cock.'"

"Why?"

"Because how am I ever supposed to dominate someone when I can't even say that word without blushing like a teenaged virgin?" Kurt regretted the words as soon as they escaped his mouth. He really didn't want to share his insecurity with anyone, let alone his brother. His heart sank a little as Finn moved further into the room and settled himself at the end of Kurt's bed like he planned to stay a while.

"Well, you are a teenaged virgin," he offered helpfully.

"Yes, thank you for pointing that out."

"And there's no rule that says you have to talk dirty you know. That's not really what it's about."

Kurt turned around again so he could look at Finn instead of his reflection. "Oh really? And what is it about, in your vast experience?"

Finn thought a moment, his fingers playing along the lines of stitching in Kurt's comforter. "I don't know. I guess it's mostly about feeling safe."

That was so unexpected that Kurt's mouth actually fell open. He had to make a conscious effort to close it. "Safe?"

"Well, yeah. Your dom makes you feel safe so you can let go, you know? Go to that place where everything's quiet and you don't really have to think about anything."

"Subspace?" Kurt knew about subspace. His book had a whole section devoted to it, and several top ten lists.

"I guess," Finn shrugged. "It's like all the other stuff is just extra, you know, like bacon and guacamole on a hamburger? It's fun and, I don't know, exciting and all. But the safe thing is really what it's all about."

Kurt couldn't quite believe he was having this conversation with Finn, of all people. But Finn was really taking it seriously, trying to help, and he was desperate enough to take help wherever it presented itself. He moved over to sit on the bed, pulling a throw pillow onto his lap and wrapping his arms around it.

"So how does she do that? Make you feel safe, I mean?"

"Well . . . let's see . . . well kneeling just sort of automatically makes you feel safe," Finn said. "And orders. Letting your dom take control. I'm not sure why, but having someone tell you exactly what to do, for a sub, it's really cool. It makes you feel cared for."

Kurt watched Finn's fingers skitter over the duvet as he tried to understand. "Having someone boss you around and give you orders makes you feel loved?" he asked skeptically.

"Yeah." Finn gave him a self-conscious smile. "I guess maybe it's just a sub thing. Does being obeyed make you feel that way?"

Kurt thought about that afternoon. About how much calmer Blaine had been on his knees. How he'd followed Kurt's commands so specifically. About the surprised surge he'd felt in his chest watching Blaine do that, knowing that his control was helping Blaine get his own equilibrium back. It had turned him on, for sure, but there had been something else, too.

"I guess it does," he answered. "So, orders yes, dirty talk, no. I won't deny that's a relief."

"Well, dirty talk's not a requirement. Don't get me wrong. It can be totally fun. This one time when Rachel . . ."

"No!" Kurt jumped from the bed, pillow flying, and fled to the farthest corner of the room, fingers in his ears. "No details! We've had this conversation, Finn."

"Sorry dude," Finn laughed and held his hands up in surrender. "No stories, I promise."

Kurt leaned against the dresser and contemplated his brother. "Can I ask you something personal?"

Finn shrugged. "Sure. Can't promise I'll answer, though. There are some things Rachel would kill me for if I told you."

"Yeah, not that kind of personal." Kurt picked up a tiny bow-tie pin from the box on his dresser and turned it around and around in his fingers. "She's not the one, is she?"

For a minute Finn just looked at him and his expression was hard for Kurt to read. There was some pain there, something like regret, maybe a little determination.

"Rachel? No. She's not."

"So how does that work?"

Finn shrugged again. "I honestly don't know, dude. But I know I love her. We're happy. I mean, some people don't find their soulmates until they're old, you know? And I'm not gonna give up something that makes me happy just because her name isn't on my wrist."

"But – what happens when one of your soulmates shows up?"

"Well, I guess someone gets to have all their dreams come true, and someone gets their heart broken. At least until they find their own soulmate."

That sounded so much like wisdom that Kurt couldn't really believe it was coming out of Finn's mouth. He felt roundly ashamed of himself. How many times had he asked Rachel to go over the soulmate "rules" with him, never really thinking that the boy she loved wasn't her soulmate at all? And here he was freaking out because the love of his life wasn't quite exactly what he'd expected. He was such an idiot. He had his soulmate. Everything else was details.

Finn must have interpreted Kurt's long silence as a clue that the conversation was over, because he jumped up from the bed. "Okay, well, Super Mario calls. Just don't say 'cock' any more, okay? It kind of creeps me out."

"Promise," Kurt nodded. "Hey Finn!" he called his brother back. "Thanks."

Finn smiled. "Any time." He held up his fist in front of his face like a microphone. "Finn Hudson for the sub's perspective!" he said in his best newscaster voice. Then he disappeared up the hall with a grin.

Kurt watched him go, then closed the bedroom door and dug his phone out of his bag. He stretched out on his bed and typed out a text before he could stop himself.

_I'm really happy that we found each other. That's all that matters._

Blaine must have been on top of his phone because the reply came back almost immediately.

_I'm so sorry for some of the things I said today. I guess I was kind of in shock._

_Don't apologize. I told you to be honest._

Why was it so much easier this way, communicating from afar with written words instead of spoken ones? He wondered if Blaine was pretending he was texting the imaginary Kurt in his head. He wasn't sure if it mattered. The silence was longer this time and he was thinking maybe Blaine had said all he was going to say when the next text finally trilled in.

_I just need you to know that I'm going to do everything I can to make this work._

Kurt smiled at that and took his own long time composing his answer.

_You don't have to do anything, Blaine. Just follow orders, which you've already proved you can do._ :)

He erased and re-typed the smiley three times before he decided to go with it.

_The teacher in me really needs to point out that it's "proven."_ :)

Kurt laughed out loud at that. Some of the tightness from earlier was starting to leave his chest. Maybe he couldn't say "cock" out loud without blushing, but he could banter gently with his soulmate, and even exchange smiley faces. Maybe they did have a chance of making it work.

_As you are my teacher, I give you blanket permission to correct grammatical errors, unscientific conclusions, and historical misrepresentations. You may not, however, criticize my wardrobe._

_Thank you, Sir. ;)_

It was equally freaky and amazing that one tiny word could make Kurt hard so very quickly.

* * *

><p><em>In the dream, Blaine is lying naked on a soft, luxurious bed. His hands are bound to the bedposts with fleece-lined leather cuffs. The room is dim, lit only by candles placed around the bed. He is waiting for Kurt, but he's not sure which Kurt: the teenaged, beautiful Kurt who seems to be baby-stepping his way toward being a dom, or the familiar fantasy Kurt who can do absolutely anything Blaine wants him to do, but only in his head.<em>

_Four sharp raps break the stillness of the room and the door swings inward. Standing in the opening is neither Kurt nor Kurt, but sweaty Curt from his last, disastrous hookup. He wears a Dalton Academy uniform and he's holding a large to-go cup of steaming coffee._

_Blaine finds himself at a loss for words, too embarrassed to speak. But Curt just moves into the room and sets the coffee down on the nightstand. He steps back and stares at Blaine's prone form. Blaine is dismayed to find he has the beginnings of an erection._

_"You need to drink the coffee, Blaine," says sweaty Curt._

_"I can't," Blaine answers, pulling at the cuffs that bind his hands. Suddenly the cuffs are gone and Blaine is sitting up on the bed, wearing his own Dalton uniform, which stretches uncomfortably over his grown-up body._

_"Drink," says Curt again._

_"I can't. He hasn't given me permission."_

_"Who?"_

_"Kurt. I don't want to make him angry."_

_Curt gives Blaine a look of pure pity; as if Blaine is the single most pathetic creature he's ever seen. "Don't you?" he asks but doesn't wait for the answer before he continues; "Kurt said you could have it."_

_Something about his tone makes Blaine ask, "Which Kurt?"_

_"Does it matter?"_

_"Of course it does."_

_"Interesting." Curt picks the coffee up from the nightstand. "You know, you really shouldn't have taken the cuffs off, Blaine. He'll be angry."_

_"I didn't take them off."_

_Curt makes a show of looking around the room. "Well who did then? There's no one else here, Blaine. You're the only one who can do it."_

_Suddenly Blaine is back on his back, naked, cuffed again as before._

_Curt pops the lid off the coffee cup. Blaine can see the steam rising from it._

_"Take the cuffs off, Blaine."_

_Blaine pulls at the soft cuffs. "I can't."_

_Curt moves closer, holding the cup of hot coffee out over Blaine's naked chest. Blaine pulls frantically at the cuffs._

_"Take them off, Blaine. No one else is going to do it. You're going to get the coffee one way or another . . ." He begins to tilt the cup over Blaine's heaving body._

_Blaine is desperate now, tugging at the cuffs as hard as he can, as if he can break them by sheer force. But they hold._

_"Please!" he cries. "I'm trying! I just don't know how."_

_Curt shakes his head, an expression of infinite sadness on his face. "I don't believe you, Blaine," he says as he tips the cup all the way forward. Blaine sucks in a breath to scream as the scalding liquid trembles at the rim of the cup then falls forward in slow motion and_

Blaine woke with a gasp, his whole body contracted in one corner of his bed, panting and trembling. The strains of the second movement of Beethoven's Moonlight sonata, playing on his phone's alarm, pounded around the walls, picking up the rhythm of his pounding heart.

Friday morning. His first full day at McKinley. His first full day of Kurt.


	6. Chapter Six

When Blaine arrived at McKinley twenty minutes early that morning he was completely unsurprised to find Kurt already waiting by his office door, one foot propped on the wall behind him, holding two large cups of coffee. The way his face lit up when he saw Blaine, teeth biting into his bottom lip to try to control the force of his smile, made him look heartbreakingly young. So young that Blaine might have turned right around and walked away, out of McKinley, out of this boy's life for good.

He might have – if it weren't for the pants.

Kurt had definitely dressed for the occasion. Looking at him, Blaine was very glad he'd put in a little extra effort himself, although he wouldn't ever admit to anyone that he'd chosen the rust-colored jeans because of the way they hugged his ass just so, or that he'd worn short sleeves in the March chill just to show off his arms. But Kurt – Kurt put him to shame. Tight slacks of some skin-hugging material, with long black and white stripes running down into the half-open laces of his Doc Martens. They made his legs look twice as long as they already were and Blaine had to exercise some serious self-discipline to control the impulse to fall to his knees and just spend all morning tracing those stripes with his fingers. There was a shirt too, of course, and a long, silver gray waistcoat-type vest that hugged Kurt's narrow hips in a way that almost made up for the fact that it covered everything above his upper thighs.

Kurt's lips were redder than usual, whether from the hot coffee or the lip-biting Blaine didn't know, and the fluorescent light of the hallway cast just the right shadow to highlight the dimple in his chin. If he put his tongue there, Blaine wondered, would it be perfectly smooth, or would he taste a tiny rasp of stubble? His tongue really wanted to know the answer.

On the whole, with the outfit, the self-conscious pose, and the boyish smile, Kurt looked like the most delectable piece of forbidden fruit any twenty-seven-year-old had ever laid eyes on. Blaine suddenly had great sympathy for Eve.

Except, he reminded himself, Kurt wasn't forbidden at all. Thanks to the marks on their wrists, Kurt was his. All he had to do was reach out.

Kurt's foot slid down the wall and crossed over his other ankle and damned if that didn't make the picture even better. "If you're going to keep looking at me like that you should probably open the door," he said, eyes sparkling, "before somebody sees you."

It shouldn't have been that difficult to get a key into a hole.

Blaine eventually managed to work the lock and pushed the door open, standing back to let Kurt go first. He followed and shut the door. He wasn't sure if he should lock it or not. Would locking it seem presumptuous? Like he expected something to happen? Screw it. He twisted the bolt home.

He hesitated for a moment, still facing the door, one hand on the lock and the other pressed flat against whatever prefab material it was made of. In a perfect, perfect world Kurt would pick up where they'd left off the day before; take the invitation and move forward to push him against the door, grinding into him, sucking a mark into the back of his neck, _claiming_ him.

"You can turn around, you know. I won't bite."

Blaine squashed a little stab of disappointment and faced the room. Kurt was setting the coffee on the desk. He rooted around in his bag and pulled out a collection of creamer cups and sugar packets, then turned back to Blaine with that slightly awkward smile.

"I didn't know what you like, so I just got you a plain drip. But there's cream and sugar."

"That's actually what I usually drink."

Kurt grinned. "Really? Well. Maybe there's something to this soulmate thing after all."

"You think?" Blaine couldn't help smiling back.

Kurt abandoned the coffee and moved closer to Blaine, who was still leaning against the door.

"I'm not sure what I'm supposed to do here," he admitted, with a little shrug.

"What do you want to do?" Blaine tried to sound nonchalant.

"I want to touch you."

It was so direct and unexpected that it took Blaine's breath away. His own voice was just a tiny bit unsteady when he spoke. "You should. If you want to."

Blaine sent out a silent _thank you_ for the impulse that had made him choose the short sleeves, because Kurt went straight there, stepping so very close and reaching out to trail two fingertips up from Blaine's left elbow to his shoulder, along the crease behind his biceps. Blaine could see in Kurt's eyes how much he liked it, and he felt little surge of pride. Kurt cupped Blaine's shoulder with his hand, then ran his palm back down again, thumb dragging over the muscle, and kept going past his elbow, down to his wrist. Blaine instinctively turned his palm out; Kurt's fingers slid between his own and they were holding hands.

"You have really nice arms," Kurt breathed. It occurred to Blaine that Kurt had probably never touched anyone else this way.

"Thank you," he said, and it felt like he meant for more than just the compliment.

It was so strange to watch Kurt try to work everything out in his head. He'd been almost awestruck touching Blaine's arm, but just standing there, holding hands, he seemed to straighten a bit, looking more self-assured, and for a moment Blaine thought he was going to be kissed again.

"Do you have any plans tonight that you can't change?"

With Kurt close enough that their chests were almost touching - so close Blaine could feel the rise and fall as he breathed - he didn't have a clue whether he had plans or not.

"No."

Kurt smiled. "I want to go to your place. After school. You live alone, right?"

Blaine could only nod.

"We need to talk. There's still a lot we have to work out. I made a list."

Blaine's eyebrows shot up. "You made a list?"

"Well I didn't want to forget anything important." Kurt looked a little hurt that his list-making had surprised Blaine. "I'm trying to be responsible about this."

Blaine squeezed Kurt's hand and smiled in what he hoped was a reassuring way. "No, that's great. A list is a great idea."

Kurt squeezed back and his face relaxed back into its happy smile. "Okay. So, I have Glee practice after school, but if you want to wait, we can meet back here and I'll just follow you home."

"Sure. That's great."

The idea of having Kurt alone in his apartment that afternoon was enough, really. Blaine couldn't ask for anything more than that. But he must have done something very, very good in a past life, because Kurt took another half step closer - now their chests _were_ touching - and leaned his face down close to Blaine's. He hesitated just long enough to murmur, "This is okay, right?"

"So okay," Blaine whispered back and then Kurt's mouth was on his, lips pressing chastely at first, but this time when Blaine's mouth opened Kurt accepted the invitation, his tongue teasing in with more confidence than before, stroking against Blaine's, exploring gently. Fingers brushed against the hand that Kurt wasn't already holding and then they were connected by both hands and their mouths, tasting, touching.

Kurt shifted a bit so that one of those long legs settled in between Blaine's. It would only have taken the tiniest movement on Blaine's part to push his groin against it, but he held back. The last thing he wanted was to scare Kurt off, and he was pretty sure grinding against Kurt's leg would be the definition of too much, too soon.

Blaine couldn't have said who moved first, if it was Kurt's idea or if he himself had somehow initiated it, but suddenly their joined hands were moving upward, and Kurt was pressing the backs of Blaine's hands into the door just above his head.

"Yes . . ." Blaine couldn't help sighing against Kurt's lips. He practically melted into the door's hard support. He felt himself start to stir toward an erection and he didn't even care. Kurt's tongue was warm and seeking in his mouth and his hands were strong in Blaine's. He wanted Kurt to know how right this was. How much he needed it. His cock lengthened, thickened; before Blaine could stop himself he'd closed the distance and brushed it faintly against Kurt's thigh.

Then he was gasping a tiny, "No," as Kurt's lips drew away. He opened his eyes to Kurt's, dark and surprised. For a moment they just stared at each other. Maybe it was the angle, or the height difference, or the layers, but he couldn't tell if Kurt was hard as well. Kurt could feel him though, it was obvious, and he didn't seem to quite know what to do about it.

Too much, too soon. Blaine held his breath.

Kurt didn't move away. Eyes locked with Blaine's, he pressed forward just a little, pushing his thigh deliberately against the hardness, and then he rocked it ever so slightly from side to side.

"Oh God . . ." Blaine gasped as pleasure swelled out from his cock to tingle down his legs and up his spine. He didn't know what to do or say. He was terrified he'd say something wrong and Kurt would stop. He fought to stay pressed into the door and not push back against Kurt's leg. He told himself to just take, accept, whatever Kurt wanted to give him.

The smile came back – the self-satisfied one Kurt had flashed him after he'd realized he'd gotten the coffee order right. His eyes lit with mischief and he rolled his leg, actually rolled it in what could only be called a grind, against Blaine's ever-harder cock, and captured his lips again in the most self-assured kiss yet, squeezing hands and demanding tongue, seeming even more emboldened by the tiny noises that Blaine wasn't even trying to suppress.

How they'd gone from awkward conversation about coffee to this Blaine wasn't sure, but he never, ever wanted it to end. Kurt's body was controlling him in so many beautiful ways – trapping his hands, owning his mouth with lips that were impossibly soft and that warm, tantalizing tongue, leg bearing down slow and controlled against his erection in a rhythmic roll that teased in the best possible way, winding Blaine higher and higher and making his body dance to Kurt's own special tune.

Then, with one last slide along Blaine's lower lip, the tongue was pulling away, the lips slipping back, the delicious pressure of the leg tapering off, hands releasing their captives. Kurt's forehead pressed to his own and Blaine opened his eyes and stared at his soulmate with wonder, chest heaving gently.

"Don't." he panted. "Don't stop. You're doing everything right." He stretched out for more of the beautiful, soft lips, but Kurt pulled them back just out of reach.

"The warning bell rang."

"No. No it didn't."

A trembling laugh shook Kurt's body. Blaine could feel it vibrate in all the places it was still touching his own. "It did, Blaine. Look at the clock."

The horrible, hateful hands of the clock on the wall pointed out 7:50. Blaine had ten minutes to get himself under control and remember something about the Industrial Revolution for the thirty-five freshmen who would be waiting for him.

"Fuck!" His head smacked back against the door, and Kurt laughed out loud this time. It was so wrong, after what they'd just been doing, to notice that the laugh made him look so much like a little boy.

"Here." Kurt reached back to grab the cups of coffee and pressed one of them into Blaine's hands. "Drink your coffee."

Blaine could only stare, unmoving.

"You have to move away from the door if I'm going to leave."

"I don't want you to leave." Blaine couldn't help pushing forward so that his erection rubbed against Kurt's thigh again. "A _responsible_ dom wouldn't leave me here like this."

He worried briefly that he'd gone too far and Kurt would misinterpret his teasing, but Kurt laughed again, and reached around Blaine to unlock the door. He had no choice but to shuffle aside as the door pulled open. He could hear the noise of students moving busily through the corridor outside.

"Well, thanks so much for the help, Mr. Anderson," Kurt said in a voice that carried out into the hallway. "I understand everything so much better now." He grinned at Blaine. "See you fourth period."

He was out the door and gone, leaving Blaine alone with hot coffee and a hard dick, feeling sort of like he'd been hit by a truck; a happy, sexy, completely overwhelming truck. He didn't even want his erection to go away. He wanted to feel like this all day; being aroused was like having Kurt there with him, wrapped around him.

Not practical, though. Especially in these jeans. He sipped his coffee and made a face at its bitterness. Reaching for a creamer, he found himself humming his alarm song – the pounding second movement of the Moonlight – and smiling and biting his bottom lip in much the same way Kurt had when Blaine had found him outside his office.

Things might be okay. Kurt just might be able to do this. It almost seemed possible that they'd find a way.

Blaine realized he was starting to let himself hope.

* * *

><p>Kurt quite literally <em>danced<em> through his morning classes. He ditched his coffee first thing – there was no need for caffeine after those ten minutes in Blaine's office. It didn't matter that he'd been up half the night buried in "Domming for Dummies" (which, it turned out, actually contained lots of helpful information) and making up his list of things to settle with Blaine. He wasn't the slightest bit tired. He had a soulmate. He had a soulmate who'd gotten hard and kind of humped his leg and told him "_You're doing everything right."_ He didn't even care that his perpetual, self-satisfied smile was getting him suspicious looks right and left.

"_Yes." "Oh, God." "So okay." "Don't stop."_ His brain kept running them on a loop, the beautiful, wrecked sound of Blaine's voice playing over and over like the best music Kurt had ever heard. Everything he saw and heard and felt was _Blaine_.

But he wasn't distracted. Absolutely not. He paid attention in every class and answered all the questions brilliantly because he was a superhero. A superhero who could ace his geometry quiz and bake a perfect red velvet cupcake and effortlessly dominate his insanely hot twenty-seven-year-old soulmate all before lunch and without breaking a sweat. Well, okay, he had sort of broken a sweat grinding into Blaine up against the office door, but that was a sex sweat, which was entirely different from an effort sweat.

He was making his (perfect, graceful, king-of-the-world) way from home ec to history when Rachel sidled up beside him and tucked a hand through his arm.

"You have about ten seconds to tell me everything or you will be in serious violation of the best friend code."

Kurt tried to look disdainful. "As usual, I have no idea what you're talking about."

"Kurt. Please. You have been walking around all morning like the cat that ate the canary. You've never looked this happy. Not even during Gaga week. Not even when Mr. Schue gave in and let us do Britney Spears. Something is up and I demand to know what it is."

"I can't just be happy to be here?"

Rachel stopped walking. "Here? Seriously? No." She dropped his arm and continued down the hallway, calling over her shoulder in a teasing singsong. "Besides, Finn told me about your conversation last night."

Kurt hurried to catch up with her. "Oh my God! Did he even wait until he got to his room, or did he call you from the hallway?"

"Actually, he waited until he saw me this morning. Which he is definitely going to be punished for. Information like that needs to be delivered immediately. Oh, it's okay," she reassured him, when Kurt looked at her like she'd lost her mind. "He likes it when I punish him."

Kurt could only shake his head and keep walking. How had he ever thought talking to Finn would be a good idea?

"The point," Rachel continued, "is that you had a conversation with Finn last night about how to be a good dom, and now you're walking around looking like you just got cast as Boq in the national tour of Wicked. You met someone, Kurt. Haven't you learned yet that you can't hide these things from me?"

They had reached their history classroom now, and Kurt pushed Rachel aside to peek around the door. Blaine wasn't inside, just a few early arrivals settling into their desks. He grabbed Rachel's arm and pulled her through the room to their usual seats.

"Okay, look," he whispered, pushing her down into her chair and rushing on despite her glare of protest, "I promise that if and when there's anything to tell, you'll be the first to know. But please, please just leave it alone for now, Rachel. Seriously."

She looked up at him. All the teasing jocularity disappeared from her face and her eyes widened.

"Oh my God. There _is_ someone, isn't there?"

And just at that moment _someone_ sauntered into the room. Kurt took his seat and clutched at Rachel's hand. "First to know. I swear. Just don't . . ." he made a little warding gesture with his free hand. Rachel smiled at him and drew a little x of promise over her heart.

Blaine went right to the desk, which was neat and organized today, and started pulling out the materials he needed for class. He had a tiny smile, and Kurt really hoped it was because of him. Other students filed in and took their seats, with Puckerman arriving last and sliding into his desk just as the bell rang.

Blaine finally looked up and surveyed the students, his eyes lingering a bit longer on Kurt than anyone else, but he stayed poised and professional. He moved around to sit down on the front edge of the desk.

"Okay," he addressed the class with a smile, "we should start over. Because I was a little . . . overwhelmed yesterday and didn't really get off on the best foot. So, Mr. Anderson," he gave a little wave, "substitute, probably for the rest of the year, and if someone would collect the homework I'll take roll." He opened the little attendance book. "I hope the questions didn't give anyone too many problems."

Rachel popped up at once to collect homework. When she passed Puck's desk he handed over a battered sheet.

"Well I only did the first three," he said. "I had a killer Halo battle going on and those questions were hard!"

Kurt couldn't resist it. "Did you think so?" he said in a sweet voice that he pitched loud enough to carry. "I didn't have any problems. In fact, I'm pretty sure I got _everything right._"

Blaine seemed to remember something vitally important he needed to write on the white board, spinning away from the twenty-two pairs of eyes on him. But the furious red creeping up the back of his neck totally gave him away.

Kurt smiled and bounced a little in his seat. This was going to be _fun._


	7. Chapter Seven

Kurt really meant to spend the entire hour teasing Blaine. He had his pencil ready, poised to do some serious pseudo-fellating. That's how they always did it in movies, right? Sucking the eraser, teasing it across his lips? That was totally his plan. But forty minutes into class he hadn't even started.

As it turned out, Blaine was a fantastic teacher. He really enjoyed history, Kurt could tell. He understood the connections between events and loved the way big historical occurrences affected ordinary, everyday people. His passion was infectious and halfway through his first real class he already had a spirited discussion going about pre- and post-Victorian morals that somehow had even Puck participating. Much as Kurt wanted to play, he couldn't quite bring himself to mess with Blaine's mojo.

"So what you're saying," Puck declared, "is that it's all thanks to this Victoria chick that I have to take a sub out for dinner before I can bend her over a desk."

"Oh my God, Noah!" Rachel glared at him. "Not every sub wants to be bent over a desk!"

"Uh, yeah, I'm pretty sure they all do. They want to be taken, and we want to take them, but since we're all moral and everything now there has to be all kinds of talking first which is total crap."

Kurt cringed a little at this and tried to gauge Blaine's reaction. Did he really want to be taken over a desk? If that was the case, there was no hope for them. Kurt may have been successful playing dom that morning, but he really thought that _taking_ of any kind was a long way off.

Blaine was more concerned with cutting off the inappropriate line of discussion than sending signals to his dom, which was an admirable quality in a teacher but a frustrating one, Kurt thought, in a sub.

"Okay," he interrupted Puck, "yes, before the Victorian period relations between doms and subs were more . . . straightforward. To varying degrees at different times, and with different levels of, um, public expression, but you're right. There weren't as many niceties as we go through now. But in exchange the Victorians introduced a new emphasis on finding and being with your soulmate."

Okay. Blaine sounded like he liked that. So having his soulmate made up for not getting bent over a desk?

"But why wouldn't people have looked for their soulmates before?" Kelly Rodinsky piped up from the back of the room. "I mean, the name is on your arm, it's pretty obvious what we're supposed to do."

"Well, for a long time people just had bigger priorities. The upper classes needed to make marriage alliances that would cement their wealth and position. And the very poor just needed to eat." Blaine turned to the white board and added to the notes there, looking over his shoulder at the class as he wrote. Kurt couldn't help noticing what the stretch did to the tendons in his neck.

"What if your soulmate was some scrawny boy who'd never be able to chop enough wood to get you through the winter? Or a sickly girl who couldn't have the children you would need to take care of you when you got old?" He stopped writing and turned back to the class. "For a long time before the Victorian era, it was really only the middle classes who had the freedom to choose to be with their soulmates. And they were looked down on by both the upper and lower classes as undisciplined because of it."

"But Romeo and Juliet were soulmates, and they were way before the Victorians," Kurt couldn't help chiming in on behalf of soulmates everywhere.

Blaine's eyes landed on Kurt and the tiny smile from before came back. So it actually was for him, Kurt thought smugly.

"Yes, but Romeo and Juliet were also an object lesson. Elizabethan audiences would have known right from the start that they were doomed, because they put being with their soulmate above obedience to their parents or family duty."

Blaine turned back to the board to write some more and Kurt was temporarily distracted from his defense of soulmates by the stretch of rust-colored denim over Blaine's ass.

"Now, by the time we get to Jane Austen, just before the Victorian period, things were starting to change. All of Austen's heroines actually end up with their soulmates; but the soulmates also always turn out to be very socially advantageous matches."

"Wait; is this history class, or literature?" Puck asked. "Because if I've been wasting time in the wrong class I'm gonna be pissed."

Blaine smiled at him. "History and literature are usually pretty well tied up together," he said, turning back to write still more notes on the white board; the stretch to reach to the top flexed his back muscles in the most beautifully distracting way.

When he turned back after repeating himself in writing again, Blaine's eyes slid across to Kurt, a wider smile pulling at the corners of his mouth, and he raised one black eyebrow just a tiny bit. It hit Kurt like a bolt out of the blue. He was doing it on purpose. Blaine was writing minutia on the board as an excuse to turn around and show off his ass in those jeans, and the way his muscles bunched as he reached up to write. Blaine was teasing _him_.

"So what changed?" Blaine asked the class, but he was still looking at Kurt. "Why were the Victorians different?"

Well, Kurt could play dirty too. "That's easy. Queen Victoria met her soulmate," he said, stretching his legs out into the aisle and crossing them at the ankle. He had seen the way Blaine had looked at his legs in his striped pants that morning. He was very pleased with himself when some of the color drained from Blaine's face. He picked up his pencil. Plan fellatio was back on.

"I'll say it again. Why does one chick meeting her soulmate end up ruining everything for the rest of us?" Puck asked.

Blaine managed to drag his gaze away from Kurt's legs and back to Puck. "Because the chick in question happened to be the Queen of England. Which at the time was the most powerful nation in the world. Victoria and Albert actually had to hide the fact that they were soulmates until after the marriage was a done deal. Even though it was a good match politically, they were afraid if it was discovered that they were soulmates someone would put a stop to the wedding. Because the Queen of England marrying her soulmate would set a dangerous precedent. Other people would want to start following her example."

Kurt was just about to make his move with the pencil when Jenn Gibbs actually raised her hand and waited to be acknowledged before she spoke. "So it's like we all wear white wedding dresses because of her, right?"

"Yes, exactly." Blaine gave her an encouraging smile. Kurt forgot about the pencil entirely and felt a little swirl of pride watching Blaine draw out the shy sub. "So why do you think the powers-that-be hated that idea?"

Jenn blushed a little. Dr. Fletcher's teaching strategy had been to pretty much let the talkers take over class discussions. Jenn wasn't really used to having attention focused on her, except as the poor sub forced to sit between Hummel and Puckerman.

"Well, I guess if some nobleman wanted his daughter to marry some old rich guy, but she wanted to marry her soulmate, she could just say 'It's good enough for the Queen' or something, right? How do you control your kids when the Queen keeps talking about how amazing it is to be with her soulmate?"

"That's exactly right," Blaine said with a nod. "And it wasn't just the nobles, or even just people in England. People around the world looked up to Victoria as an example. So her being so vocal about how happy she was with her soulmate had worldwide impact. It changed everything."

The bell rang then, and Blaine had to call out over the immediate noise of kids packing up. "Test on Chapter Six on Monday so be sure to take your books home and study."

Kurt couldn't help groaning a little. It was their first weekend together. Blaine couldn't have put off the test a few days?

"Oh, what's the matter Kurt?" Rachel teased. "Did you have big plans for the weekend?"

Blaine had begun putting away his class materials, but he froze when Rachel spoke, and tilted his head a little to listen.

"As a matter of fact I did," Kurt couldn't help confessing. "Very big plans. But now I'll have to study . . ." he sighed dramatically, which made Rachel giggle. They finished shoving books and papers into their bags, and Kurt paused by Blaine's desk as they made their way out.

"Great class, Mr. Anderson," he couldn't resist teasing. "Much better than your first one."

Blaine's eyes met his, warm and golden. "I'm glad you approve."

Oh, Kurt loved this. All his classmates were standing around oblivious to the fact that what they really were saying was _"Good boy"_ and _"Thank you, Sir."_

"So, have a good weekend," Kurt gave a little wave and led Rachel out of the room.

* * *

><p>At five minutes to four that afternoon Blaine packed up the papers he'd been grading, locked his office door, and waited – outside it – for Kurt. As attractive as the idea of another tryst in the tiny room was, he was feeling anxious and keyed up and really just wanted to get the boy back to his apartment and see what was up with this mysterious list.<p>

He'd barely confessed it to himself, but Blaine had been scared to death about teaching class with Kurt that morning. No matter how attracted he was to Kurt, no matter how much the fact that they were soulmates superseded the age difference, there was a part of him, he had to admit, that was terrified for anyone to find out what was going on. Soulmates or not, people were going to judge him.

But class had been . . . fun. They'd managed somehow to flirt and tease without anyone being the wiser, and he'd still been able to teach effectively, even the shy girl who sat next to Kurt had gotten involved. And when class ended and he'd been feeling so good about himself, Kurt had come up and told him he'd done a good job, which had rubbed him in all the right ways. He knew it would be frustrating adjusting to Kurt's pace, but there was no doubt he had a natural instinct for dominance. Even with the age difference and his lack of experience worrying him, Kurt still managed to find ways to get under Blaine's skin. The thought of what he could expect from a more confident, practiced Kurt made Blaine shiver a little. He just needed to focus on that. On what Kurt could become.

The sight of Kurt coming around the corner with a spring of excitement in his step made Blaine smile.

Kurt paused, obviously surprised to find Blaine waiting outside the office, but he recovered quickly and almost bounced up to him. For a second neither one of them seemed to know what to say, or who should say it, they just sort of grinned stupidly at each other. Then Blaine readjusted the strap of his bag and said, "So . . . Glee Club?"

Kurt did a tiny shimmy thing with his shoulders. "I did a duet with Rachel today. I should have thought – you could have lurked outside the room and listened."

"Are you good?" Blaine teased, pushing away from the door and leading the way down the corridor.

"I'm excellent."

Blaine laughed. "Who are you?"

"What do you mean?"

"Every time I see you you're a different person. You're just constantly surprising."

Kurt's eyes narrowed. "In a good way, I hope."

"In a very good way."

Kurt smiled and nibbled his lower lip in another very good way as they continued toward the exit.

"You know, I was in Glee Club too when I was in school."

Kurt turned to Blaine with comically wide eyes. "No! Really? That's such a coincidence."

"Okay, I get it," Blaine held up his hands in a gesture of surrender. "Sarcasm. Soulmate synchronicity. You're absolutely right."

Kurt tossed his head. "Of course I am. So was that here in Ohio? God, I don't even know where you're from."

They had reached the main doors, and Blaine pushed them opened and let Kurt precede him out onto the steps.

"I actually grew up right down the road in Westerville. I went to this very stuffy all-boys prep school."

Kurt stopped short and spun around. "Not Dalton Academy?"

"Yeah, how do you know Dalton?"

"We beat the crap out of them at Sectionals this year. Oh my God, you were a Warbler!" He gave Blaine an appraising look.

"What?"

"I'm trying to imagine you in that uniform."

"Hey! I looked fantastic in that uniform."

Kurt raised an eyebrow. "Oh, I bet you did." He turned and headed down the steps. Blaine hurried to keep up with him. "So if you're from Westerville, what are you doing subbing here instead of there?"

"Honestly? I knew if I went back there my parents would insist on me living with them. And that's so not an option." He shrugged, "So I flat out lied and made up something about the requirements being different down there."

Kurt clicked his tongue. "Lying to your parents Blaine? I'm very disappointed in you. And here I thought you were so honest and obedient . . ."

God, Blaine could barely keep up with the way Kurt could turn on a dime. One minute an excited teenager, the next flirty, and then the dom would pop up when Blaine least expected it. It kind of made Blaine's head spin, but not necessarily in a bad way.

They reached the faculty parking lot and Blaine dug his keys out of his bag, indicating his Prius. "Well, this is me."

Kurt nodded. "Very socially responsible. I approve."

"Can I ask you something?" Blaine blurted out before he could stop himself. It had been niggling at the back of his mind all day but he hadn't been sure if he should say anything.

"Sure."

"Something you said yesterday has been bugging me."

Kurt looked a little alarmed at that.

"Oh, not anything about us," Blaine assured him. "But . . . you said something about being tortured for being different. And I just thought I should ask if, well if I can do anything to help you with that."

"What do you mean?" Kurt asked.

"Well, I am a teacher . . ."

Kurt just stared, his mouth a little agape, and Blaine lowered his eyes to the pavement. He'd screwed up; he shouldn't have said anything.

"I'm sorry, I know I'm the sub and I'm probably overstepping somehow, but if you're getting harassed it's kind of my job . . ."

"Blaine, look at me." Kurt didn't sound angry. And when Blaine lifted his head he found Kurt looking more awed than anything. "You didn't overstep. I'm just . . ." Kurt closed his eyes for a second and then opened them again. "You are the first teacher who's ever asked me if they could help me."

"Seriously?"

He nodded. "Well, Mr. Schue – that's the Glee Club director – he tried once but that was only because something happened right in front of him. It doesn't have anything to do with you being the sub, I was just kind of shocked, that's all."

"So can I help?" Blaine ventured.

"Actually, it's been okay lately. Dave Karofsky, this football player, was sort of the ringleader. He got marked as a sub a few months ago and after that the physical stuff stopped, it was mostly just teasing, name calling. And then when I got marked even that stopped." Kurt shifted a little, moving his bag from one shoulder to the other. "I've kind of been waiting for the other shoe to drop, but I don't really think that's going to happen. I don't know if it's because he's a sub and I'm a dom, or what, but I'm okay. Really." He gave Blaine the little sideways smile that Blaine was coming to associate with Kurt being self-conscious.

"Okay, just please tell me if I can . . ."

"I promise."

Blaine had to fight back the impulse to touch Kurt, just a hand on his arm or a brush of their fingers. But it was too dangerous here where anyone could see. After a moment of slightly awkward silence Kurt waved his hand in the direction of the student parking lot. "So that's me, the black Navigator."

This time it was Blaine's mouth that fell open. "That is so not the car I'd be expecting you to drive."

"Well, my dad's a mechanic," Kurt explained. "They guy who bought it new kept having transmission problems so finally my dad offered to take it off his hands. We rebuilt the transmission together summer before last."

"Seriously?"

Kurt groaned. "Please don't say something like I look like I wouldn't know the difference between a wrench and a screwdriver, because that gets really tired."

Blaine shook his head. "No, I just – my dad and I rebuilt a Chevy together the summer before I started high school."

"What?!" Kurt gave him the cartoon eyes again, and Blaine couldn't help laughing.

"Yes, okay, we're made for each other. I never should have doubted it."

Kurt pointed a finger at him. "Never forget it. So what, is your dad a mechanic too?"

"God no. No, he got the idea right after I came out." Blaine made a face. "'Hey Dad, I'm gay.' 'That's nice, Son, let's build an engine.'"

"Oh. Ouch."

"Yeah. So was your dad . . .?"

"Oh, no," Kurt shook his head. "Not at all. I didn't even have to come out to my dad. I mean, I did, but he told me he'd known since I was three."

Blaine couldn't help being a little jealous about that. "He sounds really great."

"He is. But you'll get to see that for yourself soon, right?"

Oh God. Kurt's father. And just when Blaine was starting to feel optimistic. He must have looked as scared as he felt because there was another awkward pause, which Kurt eventually broke.

"Well, we should get going. I've only got a couple of hours tonight. Fridays are family dinner night. And then of course I have to study for this test on Monday . . ." With a grin he pulled his phone out of his bag. "Give me your address, just in case I lose you."

Blaine typed his address into Kurt's phone and handed it back. Kurt let his fingers brush back and forth over Blaine's before he took the phone back and returned it to his bag. Without another word he turned and headed with long strides through the lot to his own car. Blaine let himself linger, leaning on the Prius and watching those long legs in their striped pants walk away. He didn't have any idea what Kurt had in mind for the afternoon, but he was pretty sure he'd be surprised, no matter what.


	8. Chapter Eight

Kurt pulled the Navigator up to the curb in front of the big house, one of the picturesque leftovers from Lima's era of industrial boom. He gripped the steering wheel and allowed himself a few deep breaths as he watched Blaine pull into the driveway and climb out of his little car.

He was so nervous. Much more than he'd expected to be. He'd prepared for this. He'd gone over it in his head dozens of times, between last night and today, both the talking part and the . . . not talking part. He knew exactly what he wanted to do. People said that the longest journeys begin with a single step and this step out of his car felt like the beginning of the journey of the rest of his life.

Blaine was rummaging in the back seat for his bag and jacket and Kurt just let himself look for a moment. Watching his soulmate doing something so mundane made him understand as nothing else had done yet how important this was. It was the rest of their lives. Some day he and Blaine would be old and gray sitting in matching Shaker rocking chairs reminiscing about this day. As new and scary as this could feel, Kurt really did believe that it would be forever. That eventually everything about Blaine would be as familiar to him as . . . well, as himself.

But they would never be those old men in rockers unless Kurt could get out of the car and go join his sub, who was waiting now in the entryway, looking expectantly in his direction. Kurt grabbed his own bag and opened the door.

Blaine smiled as Kurt approached, but Kurt could tell he was keyed up too. "You didn't lose me," he called out.

"Not so far," Kurt answered.

The main door of the big house was open, and the foyer had a door on either side and a staircase that was obviously a later addition. Blaine turned to the apartment on the left, number 2, and slid his key into the lock.

"I hate it when they break these old houses up into apartments," Kurt mused, staring up at the vaulted ceiling of the entryway.

Blaine pushed the door open and stood aside so that Kurt could go in first.

"I know what you mean," he said as he closed the door behind them and turned the lock. "But it makes for really nice apartments. And the added bonus is that the one above me is vacant right now, so I don't have to listen to anyone's banging and stomping." Or worry about anyone hearing their own noises, was the unspoken end of the sentence, and that just made Kurt feel more nervous.

It was a really nice apartment. Blaine had filled it with comfortable, casual furniture; sofa, overstuffed chair, a low stone coffee table that was empty except for one oversized book whose cover was a picture of stringed instruments arranged in a pile. Against one wall stood a spinet piano that was polished to a beautiful dark shine. The wood floor was bare, and seemed like it would be murder on the knees. But maybe Blaine liked that.

It wasn't a large place – little kitchen in one corner, hallway leading off to a bedroom – but right now it seemed impossibly big to Kurt. So far he and Blaine had only been alone together in the close confines of Dr. Fletcher's tiny office. Kurt had sort of assumed that he'd be more comfortable here, with more room to move around, but in fact the exact opposite was true. In the office they were forced into close proximity. Here in Blaine's apartment it had to be a choice.

Nerves were definitely taking over Kurt's gut now. He wandered into the room a little, while Blaine hovered by the door. "It's really nice," he said with a smile. "You've done some nice things with it. And the light is really good."

Oh God. He sounded so lame. Here he was alone with his soulmate in complete privacy and he was talking about the light. He moved over to the piano and brushed his fingers over the smooth keys. "Do you play?" he asked, turning back to Blaine who still kind of hugged the door like he was afraid to step too far into the space between them.

"Yeah. I guess it's kind of self-indulgent lugging that thing around the country. But I can't really function without a piano."

"Around the country? But you grew up in Westerville."

Blaine finally gave up whatever security the door was giving him. He set his bag on the little table by the entrance and moved in to join Kurt by the piano, tapping gently at the highest "E."

"Well, I went to college at OSU and I did my graduate work in New York. So this baby has seen the inside of more than one moving truck."

Kurt wanted to ask him what he'd studied and why he'd ever chosen to leave New York to come back to Ohio, of all places, but they could talk about that later and really, he was just putting off the inevitable. Blaine had to be as anxious as he was about their talk. He needed to just take the reins and get started. But he didn't quite know how to begin. The last time he'd had Blaine on his knees he'd been angry and demanding; without that he really had no idea how to go about it. For a few moments they just stood in awkward silence (which was starting to feel like their natural state) until Blaine decided to rescue him.

"Would you like a drink or something?"

Kurt shook his head. "No, I'm okay."

"We could sit," Blaine made a little gesture toward to couch.

That was definitely his cue. Kurt took a deep breath and looked Blaine right in the eye. "Actually, I'd like . . . I want you to kneel for this."

Blaine's face twitched just a little, his eyes widening with something that Kurt hoped was excitement, but it could have been surprise or fear for all he knew. Whatever emotion he was trying to control, Blaine stepped away from the piano just a bit and waved his hand to indicate the floor where he was standing.

"Should I just . . ."

"Oh, no!" Kurt jumped in. He surveyed the room, then moved over to pull the chair around so it faced open floor instead of the coffee table. There were several dark throw pillows on the sofa and he grabbed one and turned back to Blaine.

"Is this okay?" he asked, waving the cushion in the direction of the floor. When Blaine nodded Kurt sat in the chair, put his messenger bag within reach on the coffee table, and set the pillow on the floor, far enough from his own feet that Blaine wouldn't be right on top of him.

"You can kneel here," he said, indicating the pillow at his feet. He had to bite back the impulse to say "please." He definitely felt like a kid playing grown-up and Blaine must have sensed that because he moved slowly to the pillow and stood staring into Kurt's eyes for a moment, his own expression serious, then very deliberately knelt on the little cushion, deep shining eyes on Kurt until the very last moment, when he bowed his head and turned his gaze to the floor.

Kurt could have kissed Blaine right there for the outright expression of submission. He knew Blaine was telling him that he was taking this seriously, even if Kurt barely had any idea what he was doing. He was trying to inspire Kurt with confidence. Meeting him halfway.

With another deep, steadying breath Kurt reached into his bag and laid his list out carefully next to it on the stone table. He arranged his features into what he hoped was an expression of caring authority.

"Look at me, Blaine," he ordered. Blaine raised his eyes to Kurt's again.

Kurt had to take a moment to catch his breath. The picture of Blaine looking up from his knees was even more compelling than Kurt had imagined it would be on that first day in class. He hadn't had a chance to really appreciate it the first time – in Blaine's office – when everything had been so heated. But now . . . those beautiful eyes . . .it was really a very good thing, Kurt thought, that he probably had a lifetime to figure out what color they were, because it might just take that long. Golden, honey, amber, caramel, there were so many options and "brown" didn't come close to doing them justice. And the way he simply knelt and waited – it was a dom's wet dream, really. Never mind the eyes. It was going to take Kurt a lifetime to get over the fact that Blaine was actually his.

One more quick breath and Kurt made himself start. "I really liked the way we were today," he began, "just us, flirting, or whatever. I want us to be like that. I want you to look at me and talk to me and call me Kurt. I mean, unless something else is hotter, in the moment, you know. But just normally . . ." Oh God. He was babbling already. Not a good sign. "What I mean is, I'm not looking for a slave, Blaine."

Blaine simply nodded, which didn't really help Kurt decipher his reaction.

"But for this conversation I need you to stay on your knees, and ask permission to speak unless you're answering a question. You can ask permission by touching my knee. Understand?"

Blaine nodded again and Kurt smiled a little at his immediate obedience. He'd thought hard about the whole not speaking thing, but he wanted the chance to hem and haw and think over his words without worrying about interruptions. Plus Finn had said subs liked orders and control.

"Okay, so first thing," he held his left arm out to Blaine, "take my cuff off."

Blaine's eyebrows came together a bit in confusion, but he obeyed without a word, unbuckling the strap on Kurt's cuff and sliding it off his wrist. Kurt took the cuff from Blaine and set it beside his bag and paper on the coffee table.

"Now give me yours." Blaine held out his own right arm and Kurt did the honors this time, slipping the cuff over his hand and adding it to the collection on the table. He held onto Blaine's hand for a moment, turning it over and tracing his fingers gently over the scars that spelled out "Kurt Hummel." He wondered if it would ever fail to give him a thrill, seeing his own name permanently burned into Blaine's skin.

Blaine gave a tiny sigh and Kurt pulled his gaze away from the wrist. Blaine's eyes had slipped closed so he could concentrate on the feel of Kurt's fingers on his skin. He couldn't resist trailing his fingers down over Blaine's palm, which opened, fingers stretching out under Kurt's touch.

But this was supposed to be talking. There would be time for touching later. Stick to the plan, Kurt told himself, letting Blaine's hand fall back onto his lap. Blaine opened his eyes and looked like he wanted to beg for more, but he kept silent, waiting for whatever Kurt had planned.

"I always want us to do that, when we're alone," Kurt began. "Keep our cuffs off so we can see each other's marks. And I'll always take yours off, and put it on, and you'll always do mine. Like a ritual, you know?"

Blaine nodded up at him, and Kurt really could have gotten lost in those eyes. He was starting to understand what the big deal was about having a sub on his knees. It pulled at him in all kinds of new ways that he didn't even fully understand yet. But he wanted to. He wanted to find a way to assure Blaine that eventually they were going to do absolutely everything. But the next thing on his list was kind of the exact opposite of that.

"About sex . . ."

Blaine's body stiffened just a little, as if he was steeling himself to hear something unpleasant.

"Sex – whatever we do – has to happen at my pace. If you're in this with me, Blaine, you have to accept that. I'm sixteen and I've never done_anything_, and I should have the same chance anyone else does to figure it all out step by step, and not feel pressured to do more than I'm comfortable with. I deserve that."  
>He paused here, giving Blaine a chance to ask to speak, but he stayed perfectly still, listening.<p>

"You can ask for anything, I don't want you to stop being honest about what you need, but I decide what we do and when we do it. It's not negotiable. It's just part of being with me. So can you handle that?"

Blaine took a long time to consider his answer. His body seemed to relax a little as he thought and his voice was calm when he finally answered.

"I just need you to be serious about that. About asking for things. Because I can be okay with us doing – less than I'd want. But I can't be afraid all the time that saying something or asking for something is going to freak you out."

"No, I get that," Kurt said with a smile. "I swear, you can ask me for anything. Whatever you need, no matter how crazy or intense or whatever. I may faint from embarrassment," that made Blaine smile, so Kurt counted it as a victory, "but I won't freak out. I really do want you to be able to tell me anything."

Blaine didn't speak again, he just smiled his thanks. Kurt smiled back. That had gone much better than he'd expected it to. He was starting to feel much more confident. He glanced over at his list – he really wanted to stay on track – and turned back.

"Okay, I don't think that we should make any kind of a contract right away."

Blaine's eyebrows went up, but he stayed silent, so Kurt went on. "I just think we should wait until we know each other a little bit better. And honestly I'm not ready to start going over lists of kinks with you. And I really doubt I'm going to do anything in the next few weeks that's going to hit any of your limits."

Blaine seemed to deflate a little at that, but he didn't ask to speak.

"So I figured we'd just stick with the basic rules for now – you'll obey all direct orders, I won't punish you for anything that I haven't specifically warned you about, and, well, of course you won't touch yourself or come without my permission." Kurt rushed through that last part, hoping that going fast would give him a chance to get through it without blushing. He was pretty sure he didn't succeed.

For the first time Blaine reached out and touched Kurt's knee.

"Go ahead," Kurt told him.

Again he took a moment before he spoke. Kurt was surprised how much that pleased him, seeing Blaine take this so seriously.

"I just," Blaine finally said, "if we're not going to have sex and I'm not allowed to touch myself . . ."

"That's not what I said." Kurt surprised himself with how quickly his dom side jumped in to correct Blaine. "I said you couldn't touch yourself without permission." Saying it the second time, in reaction to Blaine's mistaken assumption, he didn't feel the need to blush at all. He didn't explain any further – the distinction should be obvious to Blaine. And it must have been because Blaine settled back a little on his heels and bowed his head in acknowledgement.

The butterflies in Kurt's stomach took flight again, but it wasn't nerves this time. Somehow they were having a conversation, dom to sub, without any help from anger or lust; settling into a natural kind of dynamic. For the first time Kurt felt 100% like what he was: a dominant giving instruction to his obedient submissive. It was heady and exciting and suddenly began to feel effortless. He was starting to wrap his brain around what it meant that he was a natural dominant and Blaine a natural submissive.

After giving Blaine another moment to decide to speak, Kurt moved on.

"Anyhow, about the contract, I think until we have one we can just rely on safe words. If I somehow manage to do something that makes you uncomfortable you can safe word and we'll talk about it. Do you have a safe word?"

Blaine looked back up at Kurt. "Umm . . . yeah, to slow down it's decrescendo and to stop is . . ."

"Fermata?" Kurt couldn't help interrupting to guess.

"Caesura, actually."

Kurt didn't want to kill the dom roll he was on, but he couldn't help grinning down at Blaine. "Oh my God, I love those! You have no idea, Blaine. The thought of safe words scared the crap out of me. Like, God, I screwed up so badly that he needed to safe word! But those just make it seem like a sort of natural change in tempo. They're brilliant."

Blaine smiled a little too, and reached out to touch Kurt's knee.

"Go ahead."

"That's why I picked them. I always felt like I'd failed, somehow, if I had to use a safe word. But with these I just feel like I'm taking over the conducting for a while."

Without thinking about it, Kurt reached out and stroked Blaine's cheek in a gesture of approval and affection. "They're perfect, Blaine."

Blaine leaned a little into Blaine's hand and another wave of excitement hit Kurt. It all felt so natural now. He couldn't get over it. He let himself enjoy the contact for just a moment before he pulled back to introduce the biggest topic yet.

"Okay, for this one I just want you to talk freely, you don't have to ask to speak. We need to decide if we're going to go public with this . . . with us."

Immediately all the tension flooded back into Blaine's body and Kurt instinctively reached to caress his face again. He waited, stroking over Blaine's cheekbone, until he seemed ready to speak.

"I don't want you to take this the wrong way," he began tentatively.

"Honesty, remember?" Kurt said.

Blaine swallowed. "Okay. I'm actually terrified of people finding out. And I know us being soulmates makes it kind of okay, but I just don't see how anyone – the teachers or the students – will be able to take me seriously if they know . . ."

"That I'm your dom?" Kurt tried to help him get it out.

Blaine's eyes flitted around, from walls to floor, trying to find anywhere to look beside's Kurt's face. "That I come home at night and submit to one of my students. One of _their_ students." He struggled a little to find the words he wanted. "I know how I'd have felt – before – if I heard about a teacher in a claim with a student. I'd know in my head it was fate, but that wouldn't make feel it any less . . . wrong."

His gaze found Kurt's again, and Kurt had to struggle to control his reaction. He wasn't stupid. He'd never imagined that Blaine was overjoyed about their age difference. But he couldn't deny how much it hurt, hearing Blaine state it so baldly. And knowing that Blaine was right. People would always think of them as wrong, not matter what the law said, at least until Kurt was old enough that it wouldn't be so obvious. Hearing it like that hit him right in his own insecurities and fears. But he knew that putting his own emotions aside to make his sub feel safe was part of a dom's job. So he squashed down all the ways that Blaine's speech made him feel inadequate and did his job.

"It might be easier in some ways, though" he ventured. "Have you really thought about all the hiding and sneaking around we'll have to do?"

"I just can't. I'm sorry. I'm not ready."

It helped that Blaine looked pained, too. He didn't seem to like hurting Kurt any more than Kurt liked being hurt. He tried to pull his mouth into a smile but failed miserably. "Okay. I'm making you meet me on the sex thing so I'll meet you on this. But I'm going to insist on two things."

"Okay."

"We tell my parents. I won't lie to them so if we're going to spend any real time together they need to know."

Blaine bit his lip, but he nodded in agreement.

"And you wear a black cuff." Blaine started to speak but Kurt cut him off. "I need people to know that you're claimed, even if they don't know it's by me. You can make up anything you want – anything you feel comfortable with. But I need you to wear the cuff."

Blaine smiled. "I was going to say of course I want to wear your cuff. I want people to know I found my soulmate. It's a big deal for a sub, to be claimed like that."

Kurt smiled back – a real smile this time. "Okay then. I'll get one tomorrow." He picked up his list from the table and made a show of crumpling it up and putting it back in his bag. "So that concludes my very important list of discussion topics. Is there anything else you need to say?"

"I think you covered everything. I'm okay."

"Good." Kurt sat looking at Blaine for a bit, trying to wrestle the butterflies into submission. He'd expected the not talking part to be even scarier than the talking part, but he'd thought about this so carefully and he wanted it. He wanted to give Blaine something. To show Blaine that he wasn't about to embark on a completely sex-less life. Like everything else, though, getting started was the hardest part.

The sun was starting to go down now and light from one of the windows hit Blaine just right – shining around him in a kind of halo. He looked so beautiful and expectant, there on his knees with his hands resting on his thighs. Kurt had promised himself that he'd try to trust his instincts, so he slipped out of his chair and onto his own knees in front of Blaine, whose eyes widened as Kurt settled on the floor.

Touching Blaine's face had felt so natural before that Kurt did it again, with both hands this time, stroking his fingers down Blaine's temples and across his cheeks to rub at the scratchy stubble on his jaw. Blaine's eyes bored into Kurt's and Kurt could actually see him struggling to stay still and not look like he was asking for more. But his lips parted just a bit and Kurt couldn't resist them – so full and pink – he kissed Blaine gently, slowly, letting one of his hands slide around to cradle the back of Blaine's neck.

When he broke the kiss Blaine did the same thing he'd done before, both times Kurt had kissed him. He reached forward even as Kurt was pulling back, like he was iron and Kurt's lips were the magnet. Kurt hoped Blaine never stopped doing that. It made him feel so wanted.

He waited until Blaine opened his eyes to speak.

"I want to do something," he said. "I want to give you something. A reward. For taking this – taking _me_ – so seriously and committing to us. Okay?"

Blaine nodded. Kurt stood up (the floor really was murder – he didn't know how Blaine could stand it) and grabbed a cushion for his own knees. He dropped it on the floor behind Blaine, who looked surprised, but Kurt knew he could never do this face-to-face. Not yet. And he was determined to do it. He wanted it, he just wasn't sure how in-his-face he wanted it to be.

The light was bringing out all sorts of highlights and color in Blaine's hair, so Kurt rested a hand on his head, threading his fingers through the gently tamed curls. And like before, Blaine closed his eyes and leaned into Kurt's touch. That Blaine seemed so willing to let Kurt know how much he wanted him took some of the sting out of his earlier words about not wanting other people to know. Kurt let his hand trail down to the back of Blaine's neck and Blaine bowed his head forward, exposing more of his skin to Kurt's touch.

It was such a beautiful picture, Blaine's perfect pose of submission, that Kurt suddenly needed more, and he fell to his knees on the little cushion and pressed his lips to the back of Blaine's neck. The breathy hum that came from Blaine's throat spurred him on. He dragged his lips across Blaine's flesh, caressing down to where his skin disappeared under his shirt collar. He stroked down Blaine's arms, squeezing gently at the gorgeous muscles there, and continued all the way down to where his hands rested on top of his thighs. Blaine's hands stretched out and their fingers tangled in a kind of backwards clasp that mimicked the position of their bodies.

Kurt kissed his way back up Blaine's warm, soft neck, teasing the skin with his tongue. The taste of it, the texture of soft and hard and scratchy on his tongue, the maleness of it all inflamed him. Blaine wasn't even trying to stay quiet, giving free rein to all kinds of beautiful moans and whimpers and gasps, his fingers tightening against Kurt's. By the time his lips reached Blaine's ear he couldn't find it in himself to be at all self-conscious about saying what he'd planned to say.

"Are you hard?" he whispered.

Blaine's entire body jolted with surprise, but Kurt was on a roll now, pressed behind Blaine, tongue teasing around the outer edge of his ear.

"Are you going to make me ask again?" he said when Blaine didn't answer.

"Yes," Blaine breathed.

"Yes, I have to ask again?"

"Yes, I'm hard." It was barely more than a whisper.

Kurt was hard too, but he really only noticed it as an afterthought. He was so focused on Blaine. He wanted to do this for his sub. He slid his hands away from Blaine's, back up to stroke over his arms again.

"Undo your pants."

This time Blaine turned completely around to stare at Kurt, eyes wide with surprise or alarm – Kurt wasn't sure which. It was a serious thrill, though, knowing he'd already managed to shock Blaine into speechlessness. One point for the teenage virgin dom.

"What do . . . are you . . ." Blaine fumbled for words, but Kurt, with a hand on Blaine's chin, pushed his head firmly forward again.

"I think you heard me. Undo your pants. Or would you like to stop now?"

Blaine's hand flew to his crotch, fumbling at the button and pulling down the zipper. He stopped there, following Kurt's command exactly, as always.  
>Kurt continued to caress Blaine's arms, but he tucked his head behind Blaine's just a little. He wasn't sure how much of this he was ready to see. The idea was hot, but actually watching might be a little more than he was ready for.<p>

"Take it out."

He peeked around to watch as Blaine's hands, now visibly trembling, reached inside, maneuvered around a bit, and finally tugged his fully-erect penis out into the air. Blaine's eyes closed, as if his exposure was a little too much for him to handle.

It was Kurt's turn to gasp, and a tiny shudder shook Blaine's body when he heard it. He'd seen other guys naked, of course, but never hard and never when he actually had permission to look. Blaine was beautiful, long and thick and Kurt wanted to do more than look. He wanted to touch. He knew from the experience of his own body how soft the skin would feel, stretched over the iron hardness underneath. His breath was coming in pants that almost equaled Blaine's, now, but he wanted, needed to do this as he'd planned. He reached into his bag and rooted around for the small, round bottle.

"Hold out your hand," he told Blaine.

Eyes still tightly closed, Blaine reached out his right hand. Kurt popped open the top of the bottle and squeezed a dollop of the lubricant into his hand, trying not to let himself get distracted by the sight of his name.

It obviously became clear to Blaine at that instant what Kurt's plan was, because he sucked in a long breath and held it for a moment. Kurt let his lips settle back on Blaine's neck, sliding around to his other ear and nipping gently at the lobe.

"I want you to show me what you used to do. When you were alone. When you were waiting for me." He nosed against the skin behind Blaine's ear, breathing in the warm scent of it. "Touch yourself for me, Blaine."

Blaine let out his breath on a long, low moan, head tipping further forward, and reached without hesitation to begin stroking along his hard length, thumb sliding up over the head each time he reached the top. His body leaned back, pressing harder into Kurt's chest, and Kurt had to bite his own lip to keep himself from cheering out loud. Blaine's weight resting on him, relying on him, was as much of a validation as his words had been that morning. _You're doing everything right_.

"Remember, don't come. Tell me when you're close." Kurt rested his chin on Blaine's shoulder and let his hands roam over his sub's arms and chest, watching, fascinated and so very turned on, as Blaine's hand moved up and down and his erection twitched against it. When Kurt's fingers stroked inadvertently over a nipple, finding it stiff with arousal, and he heard Blaine's sharp intake of breath, he wished he'd thought to have Blaine take off his shirt. He teased the nipple anyhow, through the cotton; the sounds Blaine was making went right through him and he never wanted them to stop.

Blaine continued to stroke, panting out little moans and sighs, until finally his hand slowed, and his voice was hoarse when he spoke. "I'm close. I'm really close."

So soon? Kurt felt a thrill knowing he'd managed to get Blaine so worked up so quickly. "Stop, but don't let go."

Blaine's hand clenched around himself. Kurt counted slowly to ten in his head, giving Blaine time to cool off a little, then said, "Now go slow. Keep yourself close like that. But don't come until I say."

Blaine dropped his head back onto Kurt's shoulder with a groan as he gave himself over to the sensations in his body. He dragged his hand slowly up and down, always remembering to tease over the head. He was trembling now, head to toe, and Kurt wished their position on the floor would let him get close enough to rub his own erection against Blaine's back. But maybe that was for the best. Coming in these pants was not even remotely an option.

He let Blaine go on for a few minutes that way, reveling in the weight of Blaine's body, caressing up his chest to run his fingers along the stretched column of his neck, over the sharp jut of his Adam's apple, whispering to him. "You're so amazing, Blaine. God, so perfect. So, so beautiful." Every word brought more tiny whimpers from Blaine's throat, making it vibrate under Kurt's fingers.

"Please," Blaine finally panted. "Can I come? I need to come."

"Can you do a little more? Maybe five more strokes for me?"

Blaine froze and Kurt wondered if he was going to balk. But he nodded against Kurt's shoulder.

"Five more, nice and slow, then you can come whenever you want to. Count them for me."

Blaine tilted his head a little so that it rested against the curve of Kurt's neck, his hair tickling at Kurt's chin. He counted out in a shaky voice, his breath warming Kurt's skin, as he slowly teased himself through the last five strokes. Hiding was the last thing on Kurt's mind now; he wanted to see every second of Blaine's orgasm.

At the end of the fifth stroke Blaine's hand slid to a stop. "Please," he gasped.

"I already said you could come."

Kurt felt a tiny shake of Blaine's head against his neck.

"Hold me. Please."

An emotion that wasn't excitement or arousal or need flooded Kurt's body. He didn't have a name for it, but it brought tears to his eyes as he slid his arms under Blaine's and wrapped them around Blaine's chest in a tight embrace. The breath left Blaine's body in a long, deep sigh and he turned just a little to press his lips to Kurt's neck as his fist sped up around his erection. Within seconds he was coming, his body arching up and away, his mouth falling open against Kurt's skin in a silent cry as his hand stuttered to a stop and white come splashed against the black of his shirt.

Kurt meant to watch, but he was so involved with holding and supporting and murmuring gentle words into Blaine's temple that he missed the actual moment of orgasm. He didn't care. He was far too busy trying not to cry. He was overwhelmed and elated and still so very turned on. The thought of the price of his pants was the only thing keeping him from shoving forward to rut against Blaine.

Beautiful, beautiful Blaine, who'd now gone limp against Kurt's body, panting hard and clutching at Kurt's arm with his clean hand. Kurt held out as long as he could – he hated to interrupt Blaine's afterglow – but his legs were going numb and he was pretty sure he was going to just topple over if Blaine didn't move.

"You have to sit up," he said, when he couldn't hold on any longer, "or I might collapse."

Blaine pushed himself forward, still panting, and Kurt stretched his aching legs and scooted around to sit in front of his sub. Blaine's eyes were still closed, and when he opened them the urge to cry came back again. He could see whole worlds of emotion there. Looking into them, Kurt knew beyond a shadow of a doubt that he'd done exactly the right thing. He surged forward, reaching for the back of Blaine's head to pull him into a desperate, hard kiss, plundering into his mouth as Blaine opened and submitted and took.

When they finally broke apart Blaine's gaze was clearer. "That was amazing." His mouth worked around what he was trying to say. "I never expected . . ."

Kurt grinned at him. "That's me. Always surprising."

"God, you can say that again." Blaine reached out to touch Kurt's face. "Thank you."

For a second they just stared at each other like lovestruck kids, but then Blaine's eyes went wide. "Oh my God, you didn't come. Do you want me to . . ."

"No, it's okay," Kurt jumped in to reassure him. "I'm not coming in these pants, and I'm not sure I'm ready for anything else. My pace, remember?" He didn't think he needed to add that his pace was going to include a serious masturbation session later that night. "Besides, I wanted this to be for you. Tomorrow's for me."

"What's tomorrow?"

Kurt's legs were starting to feel normal again so he stood up and headed into the little kitchen. "Tomorrow, if you're free, we're going on a real date. Lunch, maybe coffee after. I'm going to pick you up and pay and everything." He found a roll of paper towels on the counter and brought them back to where Blaine had settled himself cross-legged on the floor, leaning back against the overstuffed chair.

"I'm free."

"Good."

The silence started to feel just a bit awkward, but Kurt knew how to deal with that now. He bent down and captured Blaine's mouth in another kiss, licking across his lips before pulling back teasingly. He laughed when Blaine did the magnet thing again.

"What?"

"I just like kissing you." He handed the paper towels to Blaine and settled next to him on the floor.

"I have to ask . . . where in the world did you get lube?" Blaine asked, as he cleaned himself off, tucked his now soft penis away and did up his pants.

Kurt laughed again. "My stepmother's a nurse. We have some truly amazing first aid kits in our house." He reached past Blaine to grab the bottle from the table. "Look. It's sterile."

"Well I'm impressed."

Kurt tossed the bottle back in the general direction of his bag, then took Blaine's hand in his. His body was starting to calm down now, and he let his head fall back onto the seat of the chair. He could feel Blaine shaking a bit next to him and realized that he was laughing.

"What's so funny?"

Blaine turned to him. "Nothing, I was just so worried about this talk."

"Me too! I was scared to death."

"You didn't show it. You were perfect. Very dominant."

"So you think it went okay then?" Kurt teased.

Blaine wrinkled his brow in exaggerated thought. "Well, it was kind of awkward at first. But I think that last part went really well."

They both laughed then, and Blaine shifted just a little so he could lean his head against Kurt's shoulder. Kurt didn't even think twice about rubbing his cheek against the top of Blaine's head. This was happiness, he thought. He wasn't alone any more. He'd never be alone again.


	9. Chapter Nine

Getting calmed down and out of Blaine's apartment was harder than it should have been. The ritual of putting the cuffs back on each other, with Blaine kneeling on his little pillow, was ridiculously intimate and stirred Kurt back to half-hardness. Then Kurt turned around from gathering up all of his things to find Blaine posed deliberately against the door and it was his duty, really, to push Blaine back against the wood and remind him of who he belonged to with lips and tongue and grinding hips.

And then Blaine did the magnet thing _again_, and Kurt had to make up a lie about why he kept giggling when he broke off their kisses, because he was never, ever going to point that out to Blaine and risk him getting self-conscious about it and stopping.

Fortunately, Kurt had the twenty-minute drive back to his own side of town to get his body and his brain under control. The brain was harder. He felt full to ends of his fingertips with a giddy euphoria that was bubbling up through his chest and overflowing into an uncontrollable, ear-to-ear grin. All his fears about sex and not being good enough had evaporated in the sensation of Blaine, body curving away against his arms, head pressing into his should as he came at Kurt's command. And that was the last thing he needed to be thinking about when he had to go spend the evening with his father, Carole and Finn.

Oh, God. Finn. What if Rachel had told Finn her suspicions about him meeting someone? Would Finn be stupid enough to bring something like that up at dinner? His dad would never let that go. Kurt wanted to tell them, but not tonight. He needed time to plan.

That thought alone was enough to sober Kurt up and by the time he pulled into his own driveway his acting skills were firmly in place. Not that it mattered. As it turned out Finn was far too occupied with his own life to make much trouble for Kurt. And as they passed around the roast chicken and baked potatoes Kurt kept him going, asking question after question about Coach Bieste's plans for the fall football season, until even Carole was starting to look at him a little funny.

When the meal was over both Kurt and Finn hopped up to start clearing the table. "So the new Fast and Furious movie came today," Burt said. "Anybody up for it tonight?"

"Uhh, I'm gonna meet Rachel later," Finn said, piling up an impressive stack of plates and cups.

"Yeah, sorry, Dad," Kurt chimed in. "The new history teacher is giving a test on Monday and if I want any free time this weekend I have to chain myself to my textbook tonight."

"I really don't like that guy," Finn muttered as he tried to balance one more cup on his little tower of dinnerware.

Something pinched in Kurt's chest. He stared at Finn and tried to sound nonchalant. "You don't even know him, do you? Don't you have Mrs. Delportillo for history?"

"Yeah, but Rachel won't stop talking about him. If I have to hear one more time about how his eyes 'positively shine with submission.' Eyes don't do that! The way she talks, you'd think he was her soulmate."

Carole rubbed Finn's arm. "Rachel loves you, honey. You know that."

Kurt had to drag his brain away from the mental picture of Blaine's eyes absolutely shining with submission before he could speak.

"He's not her soulmate, Finn."

"Yeah? How do you know? You don't know what her mark says. Hell, I don't know what her mark says."

"I know because he's gay." Kurt picked up his stack of plates and carried them toward the kitchen.

"Wait!" Finn called, chasing after Kurt balancing his own precarious pile. "Are you sure about that?"

Kurt set down the dishes and pulled the dishwasher open. "Positive," he said. "You have nothing to worry about."

"So is that a thing? You guys can just instantly recognize each other?"

Kurt had to bite his cheek to keep a straight face. "Yes, Finn. It's a thing."

Their parents had followed them in with the rest of the dishes and they all started a well-practiced assembly line of cleanup.

"But she won't shut up about him!" Finn said.

Carole smiled at him. "Oh, honey," she said, "that's just the hot teacher fantasy. All girls go through it. I assume he is hot," she asked Kurt.

"So hot," Kurt said with a smile.

"She did have that crush on Mr. Schue last year," Finn said, rinsing plates and handing them to Kurt.

"Well there you go," Carole said. "It's just a fun little fantasy. You're her reality."

Later, when Kurt was finally alone in his room with his little bottle of medical-grade lubricant, it wasn't Blaine's shining, submissive eyes he was fantasizing about, or the perfect swell of his ass, or even the sight of his hand sliding up and down his rosy-tipped cock. It was all the tactile things that came back to him and pushed him to stroke himself harder and faster. The catch of a tiny, hard nipple against his fingers through soft cotton. The feel under his lips of that place on Blaine's neck where afternoon stubble gave way to smooth, soft skin. And the weight. More than anything the weight of Blaine's body against his own, head thrown back, leaning on him; relying on him. Putting his pleasure in Kurt's hands, metaphorically, if not literally.

He didn't bother taking his time. He'd been up and down too many times today for that. He stroked himself with a kind of desperate speed, letting pleasure rocket through his body, and when he finally came it was to the memory of Blaine stiffening in his arms, open mouth working against his jaw, falling over into ecstasy because – and only because – Kurt allowed it.

He was pretty sure it was the most intense orgasm he'd ever had.

But despite his emotional afternoon with Blaine and the orgasm that left him limp and satiated, Kurt slept restlessly. His dreams were dark, amorphous things that he couldn't remember in the morning. They left him with an odd feeling poking against the back of his brain that something wasn't right. But he couldn't put his finger on it no matter how hard he tried, so he pushed whatever it was out of his head and concentrated on getting ready for his very first date.

When he told Blaine that today was for him, he totally meant it. Today he wasn't going to worry about acting like a dom or putting Blaine at ease, or trying to say or do the right thing. Today he was going to relax and let himself be exactly what he was: a teenager going on his very first date with an incredibly hot guy.

He took his time showering, styling and getting dressed (skinny jeans, crisp white button-down shirt, and the long, thin organic hemp scarf that Rachel had gotten him for Christmas last year) and managed to get downstairs, grab half a bagel and get out the door without anyone seeing him.

His first stop was the mall, and he took his time in Macy's, poring over the display of black cuffs that were stacked carefully next to the wallets and purses. The one he chose was simple but beautiful; dark shining leather with a tiny, almost invisible stitching detail around the edges. The salesgirl didn't quite manage to suppress her surprise at seeing someone so young buying a black cuff, but she boxed it up for him and he arrived on Blaine's doorstep at exactly 12:00, tastefully wrapped package in hand. He gave four quick raps on the door and it opened almost before the last one fell.

Blaine looked amazing as always, with a red turtleneck hugging the lines of his torso in the most delicious way. His eyes swept up and down Kurt's body, finally coming to rest on the black-wrapped box in Kurt's hands.

"Is that for me?" he asked with a smile.

"It is," Kurt said, "but you don't get to open it yet. Maybe after lunch." He moved past Blaine into the living room and set the box on the coffee table. When he turned back around Blaine was practically on top of him, expectant face tilted up.

"What?" Kurt asked.

"Don't I get a hello kiss or something?"

"I'm pretty sure the kissing happens at the end of the date, not the beginning. Were you not listening when I said we were going to do this right?"

"I was," Blaine said, pushing his bottom lip out in a tiny pout, "I just thought – since I jerked off in your arms last night – maybe we could skip some of the formalities."

It didn't even bother Kurt that he could feel himself blush at the mention of last night. He was sixteen – he was supposed to blush when someone talked about sex. "Did you miss the part where I said I've done _nothing_? This is my first date and we are doing it by the book."

"Okay!" Blaine laughed and held his hands up in surrender. "Whatever you want. Your wish is my command."

"Duh," Kurt said, pulling the door open and holding it for Blaine.

Blaine opened the door of what must have been a little closet and grabbed a jacket. "You know," he said as he passed Kurt, "you don't really didn't strike me as the kind of person who says 'duh'".

"Oh God! Maybe Finn's starting to rub off on me." Kurt followed Blaine to the car, bouncing down the walk like a six-year-old at Disneyland. He didn't care if it was undignified. He _felt_ like a six-year-old at Disneyland.

"Who's Finn?" Blaine asked as he climbed into the car.

That conversation took up most of the drive to the little restaurant Kurt had found online, just outside the northern limits of Lima. He'd tried to find a place where they were unlikely to run into anyone they knew, and the quirky café had seemed perfect. On the way, he treated Blaine to the saga of his family, complete with his crush on Finn and their disastrous first attempt to cohabitate. He learned from Blaine that his own parents were wealthy and respectable, and they'd achieved a kind of détente in their relationship, which was helped by the fact that Blaine was a serious, dedicated college student while his older brother was flitting around Hollywood pursuing the unsavory profession of acting.

"Wait, your brother is Cooper Anderson?!" Kurt said, after the waitress had delivered their drinks and taken their order. Blaine had been completely charmed to find that all the sandwiches and salads were named after birds, and he'd looked a little bit like a six-year-old himself as he happily ordered an Australian Osprey with a side of Ruby-Throated Hummingbird.

"Yes," Blaine sighed, "and yes, he's the Cooper Anderson on that cop sitcom."

"'Battle of the Badge!' My stepmother loves that show. Wait till I tell her . . ." Kurt trailed off at the thought of what telling her would actually entail.

"Yeah, about that . . ."

Kurt took a sip from his diet coke. "Well, I think we should just get it over with. The sooner the better. We usually have a late breakfast Sundays because the shop is closed, so I thought you could come over tomorrow and . . . take the plunge?"

Blaine shifted uncomfortably in his seat. "What if they hate me?" he asked.

"You're my soulmate. That's the one thing they can't argue with. They can try and make rules about when we see each other, and where and how often, but they can't do anything to really keep us apart."

That kind of killed the conversation for a bit, but the waitress soon rescued them by delivering their food and they kept the conversation to safe topics like whether Kurt would ever get a competition solo and the genius (in Blaine's opinion) of the blood oranges on the Ruby-Throated Hummingbird. Kurt loved seeing this new, whimsical side of Blaine. He himself was often accused of being too practical and down-to-earth, but anyone who paid any attention to his wardrobe had to admit that Kurt has his own streak of whimsy.

On the whole, everything was going beautifully and just according to plan. Blaine didn't say a word when the check came and Kurt reached for his wallet. He let Kurt lead him out to the Navigator and hold the door for him to climb inside.

Their second stop was a tiny coffee shop, another Internet find, where they ordered drinks (and Kurt was happy to see that Blaine really did order plain drip) and settled into armchairs around a tiny table.

"So why would anyone ever leave New York to come back to Ohio and be a substitute teacher?" Kurt asked, sipping carefully at his hot mocha.

Blaine took a moment to think before he answered. "I guess I just needed a change," he shrugged. "I've basically been in school my entire life. I was supposed to start on my Ph.D. last fall at NYU. But I sort of had a late identity crisis, I guess. I realized that my dream of teaching English or History at some private college in New England wasn't ever really my dream at all. I was just following the path of least resistance."

"So what's your dream?"

Blaine hesitated again. "Have you ever heard of music therapy?"

"What's that?"

Blaine took a sip of his coffee. "It's pretty much what it sounds like. Using music for therapy. But it's not just, you know, making people happy with music, although that's part of it. But certain scales or progressions, the shape of the music can have a physiological effect on the brain."

"Really?"

Blaine put his coffee down and leaned in closer to Kurt. His excitement lit up his face. "It's amazing, actually. Like, when they play certain kinds of music during therapy, stroke victims actually relearn to walk faster."

"Wow," Kurt said, "That definitely sounds like you. But would you have to start all over again with school?"

Blaine shrugged. "My Bachelor's degree is in education, which might be okay, but I'd probably have to start over at the graduate level, and I don't know . . . I mean, now that I've met you . . . and you still have one more year of high school then I have no idea what you want to do . . ."

Kurt probably should have been concerned that their situation was making Blaine reevaluate his goals, but he was too busy feeling happy that Blaine was thinking about them merging their lives and plans like that. "So your jailbait boyfriend's throwing a wrench in your ambitions, huh?"

Blaine laughed a little and lowered his eyes in a way that was almost shy. "Very nice, slipping the B word in there like that. Very smooth."

"I thought so."

Blaine took another sip of his coffee. "You're not, you know," he said casually.

A pain tightened in Kurt's chest. "Not your boyfriend?" he asked.

"Oh, God, of course you are," Blaine said, and Kurt took a little relieved breath. "After last night I think that's the least of what you are!" He put his cup down and lowered his voice a bit. "I meant you're not jailbait. Sixteen is the age of consent in Ohio."

"How do I know you actually looked that up?" Blaine glanced down at the table and his face colored a little. Kurt took a quick look around the coffee shop – almost completely deserted now – and held his hand out, palm up, on the little table. "Give me your hand," he said.

Blaine did his own survey of the room and then placed his hand gently on top of Kurt's. "I promise we'll work all this out," Kurt said. "New York is my dream too, you know. So maybe you'll wait another year, or maybe you'll go without me for a while" – Kurt thrilled a little when Blaine's head automatically shook in denial of that – "but I'm not going to settle for anything less than both of us living our dreams. We just have to find a way."

Blaine's hand squeezed his, "I'm starting to believe you can do anything you put your mind to."

"Don't you forget that."

They just smiled at each other then; another of what Kurt was coming to think of as their lovesick puppy moments. He didn't think he'd ever get tired of having those deep, beautiful eyes boring into his. He let his fingers move slowly under Blaine's hand and Blaine responded, sitting still, stroking gently. The feather-light touches felt more intense than they should and sent little sparks of electricity shooting through Kurt's belly.

"So how's your first date going?" Blaine asked.

"I think it might be the best first date ever."

"Any decision on that end-of-date kiss?"

Kurt grinned at him. "Play your cards right . . ."

"Blaine Anderson?!"

Blaine instantly snatched his hand back, and they both looked up to find a handsome, tall, blonde approaching their table with coffee in his hand. His smile was broad and toothy and he looked astonished to see Blaine.

"I thought that was you! Oh. My. God!"

Blaine rubbed his palms against his pants and grinned at the man in a way that seemed just a little forced. "Kev! Wow. What a surprise."

"I know!" Kev snagged a chair from a nearby table and dragged it over to sit. "How long has it been? Like, four years, right? How crazy is this?!"

"Crazy . . ." Blaine just stared at the blonde man, and only seemed to remember Kurt when Kev looked pointedly at him. "Kev, this is my . . ."

Kurt jumped in to rescue him, trying not to feel disappointed. They had agreed not to go public, after all. "I'm Kurt." He held out a hand that the blonde took in a strong grip. Kurt noticed the cuff on his left wrist at about the same time that Kev noticed Kurt's.

"Kevin Chambers. Nice to meet you, Kurt." His eyes shifted from Kurt to Blaine like he was trying to figure them out. "Blaine Anderson," he said again, and Kurt wasn't sure he liked the tone in his voice when he said it. Blaine, for his part, seemed to be trying to look anywhere but at either of the doms he was sitting with.

"So how do you two know each other?" Kurt forced himself to ask before Kev could beat him to it.

"We went to OSU together," Blaine said.

Kevin barked a loud, sharp laugh. "Well that's one way of putting it. Not that we ever had any classes together or anything. We actually just fucked at OSU."

"Kev!" Blaine turned scarlet at this and, oh yes, Kurt definitely didn't like this Kev guy.

"Oh, I'm sorry," Kev lowered his voice to a near whisper. "Should I not be cursing in front of . . ." he jerked his head in Kurt's direction. Blaine looked even more embarrassed and Kurt grabbed his coffee and sucked down a long gulp, trying to control the new feelings coursing through his body. He was pretty sure they were dom feelings and he didn't want to lose it here in public when they'd agreed to keep their relationship secret.

Kev looked again from Kurt to Blaine, suspiciously, like he almost didn't trust what his eyes were telling him. He turned to Blaine, finally, and smiled. "Well, in any case, it's really great to see you again. I never thought I would." He rested his hand on Blaine's arm, just above his cuff.

"Don't touch him," Kurt said without thinking, in a voice he barely recognized.

Kev's head turned sharply in Kurt's direction as he evaluated this challenge, hand still on Blaine's arm. Blaine pulled away, though, and gave Kurt a look that was probably supposed to be apologetic, but managed to look more guilty than anything.

"It's okay," he said. "Kev's always had a problem with personal boundaries."

Kev was still looking at Kurt and he was starting to get it, Kurt could see that, but he still didn't quite believe what he was getting. He smiled at Kurt quite deliberately.

"Yeah, I don't much like boundaries of any kind. Blaine had to redraw quite a few of his after we were together. But I'm pretty sure he thought it was worth it."

Kurt was trembling with the force of emotion in his body and the effort to keep himself still. One way or another, he was pretty sure this wasn't going to end well.

Kev turned back to Blaine and lowered his voice again. "So what do you say we ditch your little brother and get reacquainted, Blaine? It's been four years. That's gotta be long enough for a repeat." He rested his hand again, very deliberately, on Blaine's forearm, stroking just above his cuff.

Kurt was done. An intensity of possessiveness like he'd never felt before in his life was threatening to overwhelm him. He pushed himself out of his chair and glared down at the blonde. "I said, don't touch him."

Kev was out of his chair just as quickly, shoving himself up to stand practically nose-to-nose with Kurt. "I don't see a black cuff on his arm," he said with a supercilious smile, "which means the only person who can tell me not to touch him – is him."

They both turned to stare at Blaine, who sat miserably, looking like he was trying to disappear into his chair.

Kurt was a pacifist. He'd always been a pacifist. He'd been pushed around too much to ever want to hurt anyone else like he'd been hurt. But he was very, very sure that between his dom hormones and Kev's, someone was going to get hurt. He really wanted to see some blood on that smug face. And just the thought of that should be making him turn and walk away but his body simply wouldn't let him. His body dug in his pocket for his keys and dropped them onto the table.

"Go wait for me in the car Blaine."

Kev's smile widened in anticipation. Kurt's breathing sounded far too loud in his ears. Blaine didn't move.

Blaine didn't move.

Again, both doms turned sharply in Blaine's direction. Kurt wasn't sure which emotion on which dom's face made Blaine look like a deer in headlights. He didn't really care. In a surge like a bolt of lightning he was overwhelmed by the sudden realization of his own incredible stupidity. And for the longest moment all he could do was stand there, stunned, as everything came crashing down around his ears and _Blaine didn't move_.

So Kurt moved.

He pushed past Kev, who was smiling like he'd won some kind of victory, shoved Kev's pilfered chair out of the way, snatched up his keys, turned, and walked out.

When Kurt was nine his dad had told him there was no Santa Claus. Burt had been as gentle as he could, worried that Kurt would feel sad or angry or even betrayed. Kurt didn't feel any of that. He felt completely and overwhelmingly stupid. It was so obvious, once Burt said it out loud, that something magical like that couldn't actually be real, and for Kurt, realizing the extent of his own gullibility had made him feel like an idiot. It was the humiliation that had really hurt. Knowing that he'd let the grownups pull the wool over his eyes all those years.

And that's what he felt as he forced one foot in front of the other across the coffee shop parking lot. He was shaking with anger and humiliation. He'd been such an idiot. He'd managed to convince himself – to allow Blaine to convince him – that somehow his pitiful efforts would be enough. Blaine had said all the right things but really he'd only been playing pretend. Maybe he'd been trying to make the best of a bad situation. But the second a real dom showed his face Blaine was reduced to silent submission in moments, disobeying Kurt's direct order, not even willing to introduce him to the asshole.

And then the thing that had been bothering him since his restless dreams last night finally pushed itself into his consciousness.

He climbed into the driver's seat, still shaking. He just had to keep himself under control until he got home. Then he could go hide in his room and fall apart.

He didn't realize that Blaine had followed him out of the coffee shop until the passenger door opened and Blaine climbed in. He sat and wrapped his arms around himself, as if he was trying to make himself as tiny as possible.

"You have to let me . . ." he said in a small, small voice.

"Shut up." If Blaine tried to explain himself now Kurt knew he was going to cry.

Blaine shut up. Kurt started the car and pulled out into traffic.

Huddled miserably against the passenger door, Blaine berated himself over and over again in his head. He'd fucked up. He'd fucked up and Kurt was furious and maybe they were done; he didn't know but he was terrified and he wasn't even sure of what.

He knew Kurt thought his hesitation had meant that he wanted to go with Kev, and that wasn't it, not really, but he didn't even know how he'd begin to explain that to Kurt. It was just that having Kev there and remembering the night they'd spent together – it had brought back such visceral memories. Kev had been right. Their night had been amazing and he had pushed so many of Blaine's boundaries in such a skillful way. Blaine could still feel the wide leather belt smacking down on his ass, his thighs, his upper back. He'd pleaded and begged for mercy but he hadn't safe worded and Kev had pushed and pushed – he'd felt those hits for days and days afterwards – until even the sound of his own begging was turning him on almost beyond endurance.

Then Kev had ordered him onto his knees and made Blaine suck him off, slowly, teasing him with detailed effusions about how amazing it all felt as Blaine's own cock fucked empty air, aching and untouched. He'd laid Blaine out on the bed, the duvet harsh against his abused back, and stroked and teased him until his own body was ready to go again, then he'd fucked him, deliberately and slowly, forbidding him to come, until Blaine was a pile of sobbing, begging, incoherent need. And after he'd come a second time, Kev had blown Blaine as slowly as he'd made Blaine blow him, finally, finally letting him crash into an orgasm so intense that he was pretty sure it took years off his life.

Blaine had loved every second of it.

And there in the coffee shop, confronted with Kev, with the memory of what Kev had done to him and for him, all the optimism that Blaine had carefully built up about himself and Kurt had come undone in moments. He didn't want Kev. Kev had been nothing but a pair of hands and a mouth and a dick. But he desperately, desperately wanted what Kev had done. And no matter how hard Kurt was trying or how fantastic last night had been, Kurt was years, _years_ away from that. And Kurt's command in the café had caught him mid-realization and for that one moment he just . . . couldn't. He couldn't take that active step to choose Kurt and all he represented. Not with Kev, and all he represented, staring at him like he wanted to eat him alive.

Kurt was driving with a death grip on the steering wheel, emotion radiating off him and filling the interior of the car. He was so angry and still that Blaine didn't know whether to cry or try to apologize or somehow try to defend himself. So he sat in miserable silence until the Navigator pulled up in front of his apartment.

Neither of them moved; Kurt didn't seem inclined to leave the car and there was no way Blaine was going to get out and go inside and give him the option of just driving away. Finally, Kurt killed the engine and climbed out. He walked around the front of the car and opened Blaine's door. Blaine didn't move.

"Get out of the car." Kurt wouldn't look at him, and his voice was cold enough to freeze water, steady and remote and completely controlled. But Blaine could feel all the emotion under the surface.

"Come inside with me. Please. Just let me . . ."

"Get. Out."

Even in whatever crazy limbo state they'd found themselves, Blaine couldn't bring himself to disobey. He climbed down from the seat; he was close enough to brush Kurt's shoulder as he passed but Kurt stepped back away from him, avoiding any contact.

"Please . . ." Blaine tried again.

Kurt stood still as a statue, nothing moved, not a muscle. He stared off into the distance and waited.

Finally Blaine turned, defeated, and headed up the walk toward the front door. He heard the door of the Navigator slam shut, but it wasn't until he'd pushed into the entryway and the door didn't immediately close behind him that he realized Kurt was following him. He didn't know whether he felt more hope or fear as he struggled to get his hand to stop trembling enough to unlock his front door.

Once inside Blaine stripped off his jacket dropped it on the little table in the entryway, and took only a few steps into the room before falling to his knees. He bowed his head, rested his hands on his thighs. He just needed to make himself as small and submissive as possible until Kurt calmed down enough to be willing to talk to him, or even look at him. He clung to the fact that Kurt was here, instead of halfway back to his own house, as his only source of hope.

He heard the door close quietly – he'd steeled himself for a slam – and Kurt remained still, facing the door, one hand on it like it was his anchor. When he finally turned he ignored Blaine, walking slowly over to the coffee table and picking up the black-wrapped present still sitting there. Then in one swift motion he threw it – hard – Blaine heard the grunt of effort – into the kitchen. It smacked against the refrigerator and bounced onto the floor.

That seemed to break the dam in Kurt. His keys slipped from his other hand onto the floor, unnoticed. He sucked in breaths in audible, shuddering gasps, doing some odd combination of pacing and rocking, still ignoring Blaine. When he finally turned to look at him, Kurt looked so fragile and young and hurt that Blaine wanted to prostrate himself on the floor and grovel for forgiveness.

"This isn't about Kev," he tried to begin. "You have to . . ."

"I know this isn't about Kev! I'm not an idiot!" Kurt stopped directly in front of Blaine, and he looked up into a face that reflected so much hurt and anger that part of Blaine wanted to run away from it and hide. But another part, a bigger part, wanted so badly to fix it and to bring back the beautiful, happy Kurt who'd bounced on his doorstep earlier.

"I was stupid in the coffee shop. It was all overwhelming me, seeing him like that, and I . . . I just fucked up. But that doesn't mean we're not okay."

Kurt just stared, wrapping his arms around his body like he was trying to keep himself from collapsing inward. His lips were trembling just a tiny bit and his eyes brimmed with tears. He shook his head and when he spoke it was almost to himself.

"I can't do this."

Blaine's own head shook sharply in denial. "You can. We can. It was one stupid screw up and I'm so, so sorry . . ."

Kurt just stood there, looking down at Blaine with those eyes that opened him up and exposed all of his secrets. Finally, in a voice that sounded like it had to fight its way out of his throat, Kurt said, "You never say my name."

"That's not true," Blaine denied. But as soon as he said it he knew that it was.

"You have said my name exactly two times. Once right after I told it to you and yesterday when you took role in class."

And God, he knew Kurt was right but somehow he couldn't bring himself to admit it out loud, not with the tears starting to overflow Kurt's eyes. He scrubbed at them with the back of his hand almost automatically, without thinking, as if crying was so normal for him that he didn't really notice it at all.

"Last night, I must have . . ."

"You didn't, Blaine. You never do. And I know why." He was pacing now, gathering up steam. "Because if you call me Kurt, then you have to accept that I'm it. I'm the only soulmate you're going to get. And you can't do that. No matter how much you talk about wanting to make us work, you just can't bring yourself to let go of that fantasy in your head." He stopped and stood still in front of Blaine, swiping at the tears that still escaped from his eyes. He looked at Blaine with so much sadness and pity that Blaine ached to find a way to explain or to fix this. But Kurt was right. He was exactly right and Blaine had no idea what he was supposed to do to help.

"Nothing I do is ever going to be good enough for you, is it?"

"It is. It will. I told you I can wait." He had to find a way to make Kurt understand.

Kurt shook his head. "But I can't. I can't be with someone who's just passing time waiting for me become someone else. I can't wonder when you're going to choose to act like a sub and when you're not. I can't compete with some idealized version of me that you made up in your head when I was three. I deserve more than that. I deserve better." He ran a restless hand through his hair. "And if that means giving up my soulmate then I guess that's what I'll have to do."

_Better_. It went through Blaine like an arrow to the heart. Because in all of his worrying and wondering if Kurt could be good enough for him, it had never occurred to him that maybe he couldn't be good enough for Kurt. And now he saw it, clear as day, with all of his spouting about trying to be the perfect sub; he'd been absolutely nothing that Kurt had needed him to be. It had been all about him – what Kurt could do for him, how Kurt could touch him – and never about actually figuring out what Kurt wanted from him and trying to give him whatever that was. He'd told himself he was helping Kurt when really all he'd been doing was trying to lead him. Trying to coax him into acting more and more like the fantasy. Blaine felt a lump start to swell in his throat and he bowed his head again, fighting back tears himself this time.

All of the energy seemed to have left Kurt's body and he stood, still holding himself, still crying slow tears that went completely ignored now.

"Please, just give me a chance," Blaine begged again, looking up into tired blue eyes. "I know I screwed up, but I want to be with you. I want us to find a way, I swear to God I do."

Kurt shook his head. "I don't believe you," he said sadly. "I don't think you will ever be ready to walk away from him. He's your safety net. He keeps you from having to actually open yourself up to a real person who might screw up or disappoint you or whatever. I may not know what I'm doing here, but I know you can't commit to both of us. And you gave your heart to him a long time ago. I never even had a chance." Kurt had stopped crying and some of his anger seemed to be coming back. He picked up his keys from the where they'd fallen by the coffee table then looked down at Blaine. "I'm sorry, Blaine."

He turned toward the door.

Blaine didn't know anything at that moment beyond the fact that he couldn't let Kurt go out that door. "No, just, please don't go yet," he begged. "You're right! Everything you said is right but that doesn't mean I don't want you. We can figure it out together – I'll do anything you need me to, I swear." The idea of watching Kurt walk out of his life seemed impossible. It felt as much like giving up on everything he'd ever dreamed of as the idea of committing to Kurt had been on that first day. As much as his brain tried to tell him that maybe it was for the best and maybe Kurt would be happier this way, he simply couldn't let it happen.

But Kurt's hand was on the doorknob.

"Kurt!" he cried, putting every ounce of pleading he could find in his heart into Kurt's name.

Kurt stopped. He didn't turn around but he didn't open the door either.

"Give me a chance. God, please. You can punish me, you can ignore me, you can scream at me if you need to, but please, please don't go out that door. I need you, Kurt. I can't figure out how to do this without you."

"You have to give it up," Kurt's voice was still cold. "I won't come in second to your imaginary friend. You have to let him go."

"I want to, I just don't know how." That was as bare and honest as Blaine had ever been in his life. He felt his own eyes start to swim with tears. "But you do. You have to because you said you were the only one who could give me what I need. Well this is what I need. So stay. Help me."

Kurt turned. He didn't look sad any more. His body was still trembling gently, but his face was resolute and wary and maybe angry at Blaine for throwing his own words back at him. He stared at Blaine kneeling there on the hard floor; looked him up and down, like he was trying to decide if Blaine was worth the effort. But Blaine could see that Kurt wanted him. Kurt was trembling on the brink of something and Blaine knew instinctively that he needed to push his soulmate over that edge if he had any hope at all of happiness.

"Please, Kurt. I'll do anything you want. Just tell me, and I swear I'll do it."

Kurt took a deep breath and pressed his lips together in a thin line of determination. Something shifted in his body, his entire attitude changed, and he pushed away from the door. "Okay," he said and Blaine felt an overwhelming sense of relief flood his body. Kurt dropped his keys back on the table and turned to Blaine with absolute command on his face.

"Strip."


	10. Chapter Ten

Blaine's mouth fell open and he gaped at Kurt, unable to even begin to process the order. It was probably the very last thing he expected to hear come out of Kurt's mouth at that moment. He had to have misheard because there was no way, after everything they'd just said to each other, that Kurt had told him to take his clothes off.

"I'm not telling you twice."

_Listen to Kurt. Don't question. Do as you're told._

Blaine recited it to himself like a mantra. If he wanted to keep Kurt here, or just to keep Kurt, he had to find a way to shut down all those parts of his brain that wanted to understand and control. Blaine grabbed his sweater and t-shirt and pulled them over his head as one. By the time his face emerged from all the cotton and wool Kurt was no longer standing in front of him. He could hear him in the kitchen, of all places, opening and closing drawers looking for something.

He stood up long enough to strip off his pants, underwear, socks and shoes then panicked a little because he didn't know what to do with them. Something told him Kurt wouldn't like them strewn all over the floor. He pushed them into a semi-neat pile under the little table that he'd flung his jacket over and was back in position on his knees by the time Kurt returned, empty-handed, to stand in front of him.

It should have made him feel more vulnerable and exposed, kneeling naked in front of Kurt, but it actually did just the opposite. This was submission 101, basic and familiar and oddly calming. He looked up at Kurt who barely seemed to register Blaine's naked body. He was only looking in Blaine's eyes, and although his breath was still coming in hard, fast pants, he didn't seem angry. Blaine wasn't sure what Kurt was feeling.

_Listen. Watch. Wait._

"Your cuff, too." Kurt said. His voice didn't betray any emotion at all. He was completely in control of himself now.

Blaine held his arm up to Kurt, but Kurt made no move to take it.

"You said we'd always . . ." Blaine prodded.

"Take it off, Blaine." Still controlled, distant.

So this was some kind of test, Blaine realized. Kurt hadn't fully decided what he was going to do. There was still a chance that Blaine could fuck this up. He unclasped the cuff and pulled it off his arm. Not knowing what else to do, he held it out to Kurt.

Kurt took the cuff from him and set it on the coffee table. Then he knelt in front of Blaine, and they were close enough now that Blaine could see Kurt's eyes flicker over his body, tiny cracks in the control he was trying to project, and for just a second Blaine thought that Kurt might just kiss him there on the floor and tell him that everything was going to be okay.

"Hold out your arms."

Kurt was inches away, he could have just grabbed Blaine's arms if he'd wanted to, but Blaine obeyed, reaching out as far as he could without actually touching Kurt. Kurt's hands were brusque and businesslike. He turned Blaine's arms around so that both his palms were facing outward, and moved the right forearm to rest on top of the left. Then he reached for the long, narrow scarf he was wearing and pulled it from around his neck.

Kurt was going to tie him up.

Blaine had thought being told to strip was the very last thing he'd expected, but this, this was so out-of-left-field that he couldn't even begin to process it. He knew his mouth was gaping open again and he couldn't seem to remember how to make it close. He searched Kurt's eyes for any clue at all to what was about to happen, but Kurt only looked at Blaine's arms, where he was carefully wrapping the scarf, starting at Blaine's wrists just above his mark and moving up to his elbows, then down again, criss-crossing the soft material and tying it off at the wrists. It was long enough that loose ends hung down to the floor.

_Wait,_ Blaine told himself. _Listen. Obey._

The strange position pulled at Blaine's shoulders and upper back. It also pulled at other parts of his body; he could feel his cock start to stir. He wondered if Kurt would notice it.

_Don't wonder. Just be._

When Kurt finally looked up from his handiwork he seemed as surprised as Blaine at what he'd done. He looked at Blaine like he was almost afraid that he'd gone too far and that Blaine would balk. The realization sunk into Blaine that something big was about to happen.

Blaine wanted Kurt to trust him to be honest and submit. He lowered his eyes and bowed his head, hoping Kurt would see that for what it was.

_Do what you need to. I'm yours._

It must have been the right move, because Kurt let out a long, slow breath, like he was trying to prepare himself for something, and then said, "Go stand facing the wall."

He didn't offer any help, so Blaine had to struggle to rise without the use of his hands. Kurt stood up too, and tilted his head in the direction of the wall next to the kitchen island. Blaine walked over and stood as close to the wall as his bound hands would allow, his eyes lowered to the floor.

_Stop guessing. Don't guess. Just do._

Kurt went into the kitchen, picked something up from the counter, then came back around to Blaine's other side so he could see what Kurt was holding. It was a wooden spoon. It was so incongruous that at first Blaine couldn't imagine what Kurt was going to do with it. It took longer than it should have, considering he was bound and facing a wall, for him to realize that Kurt was going to spank him. With a wooden spoon. He would have laughed; it was almost funny, given all the many things Blaine had been hit with since he started experimenting with other men, but he was too busy trying to wrap his brain around the fact that Kurt was going to punish him.

Blaine had never been punished.

He'd role-played punishment dozens of times, both in carefully scripted scenes and looser, improvised situations, but whatever the rules of the game, the punishment had never been real. He'd never been with anyone long enough to have rules and consequences for actual misbehavior. But this was definitely real. One look at Kurt's face told him it was real and crucial and Blaine could completely fuck this up because he had no fucking clue what Kurt wanted from him.

_Don't think. Don't question. Just be. Just allow._

Kurt touched him then, taking his wrists and bending his arms upward so that the backs were resting against the wall and his mark, Kurt Hummel, was directly in front of his eyes. He stared at it and they both stood in silence. Nerves began to tingle in Blaine's abdomen. Some kind of ominous feeling was starting to build inside him, like looming storm clouds. He desperately wished he understood anything that was happening.

"Look at me." Kurt was standing beside Blaine and he only had to turn his head slightly to obey the command. He wondered fleetingly when he would stop meeting new Kurts, because this was another one he hadn't seen before. Kurt seemed totally sure of himself, very serious and determined. His eyes bored into Blaine's and seemed to leave him no place to hide. Looking at Kurt like this, he could still see the silvery lines of his mark as well. The name there, next to the person, started an unexpected lump swelling in Blaine's throat.

"Why am I punishing you?" Kurt asked quietly. The more keyed up Blaine felt, the calmer Kurt seemed to become.

"I disobeyed you in the coffee shop."

"And?"

Blaine didn't want to answer that. He didn't want to go any deeper than he already was into guilt and regret. But Kurt's eyes were there inches from his and they wouldn't let him go.

"And I wasn't honest with you," he let his gaze flicker away to look directly at the mark in front of his face. "Or myself."

Blaine thought he detected a slight catch in Kurt's breathing; it made him feel better to think that maybe Kurt was as affected as he was, no matter how well he was controlling it.

"What does your mark say, Blaine?" God, it was almost conversational, just a random question anyone might ask. Blaine thought he might start hyperventilating.

"Kurt Hummel," Blaine had to push it past the blockage in his throat.

The spoon came down with a sharp slap on the right side of Blaine's ass. There had been no warning, not a single tell on Kurt's face, and Blaine gasped. The pain was real but ephemeral; a strong sting that faded quickly. And even after the smack Kurt's face betrayed no reaction at all. Whatever he might be feeling, he had it completely under control.

"You're going to say it after every stroke. That's all you have to do, Blaine. Just say my name."

Blaine kept his head turned so the only things in his field of vision were the white wall, the soft letters of his mark, and the blue-gray-green eyes that never left his. Somehow without looking Kurt found the other ass cheek with his spoon and the second smack hit hard and fleeting.

"Kurt Hummel."

This should be easy, right? Take the hits (and really, he'd had more intense warm-up spankings), say the name, and Kurt would be satisfied. Kurt would stay. He didn't have to do anything more than stay still, look in Kurt's eyes, and say two little words.

"Kurt Hummel."

But the lump in his throat was getting bigger. The name, when he said it, pulled sharply somewhere in his chest and it shouldn't, just saying someone's name shouldn't feel like it was opening him up, sending pain deeper than the spoon smacking his skin.

"Kurt Hummel."

After the fourth stroke Kurt's eyes started to lose their distance and really _look._ They wanted something, Blaine knew. Something that the lump in his throat and the weight in his chest understood but his brain couldn't seem to figure out.

_Listen. Look. Feel._

The sting in his ass, although hardly enough to bother him, started to seem like a physical extension of the eyes, and the name on his wrist, so carefully bound in Kurt's own scarf, connected eyes and mouth and breath as Blaine spoke the two words; all he had to offer to Kurt in penance.

"Kurt Hummel."

After the sixth stroke Blaine was gasping (why was he gasping? The spanking was nothing. Kurt wasn't even working up a sweat) and he knew he couldn't have looked away from Kurt's eyes if he'd wanted to. Those eyes and the name on his wrist and lips anchored him in a loop that seemed to tighten with every slap of the spoon against his flesh. That tightened like the muscles of his throat, which had to work harder and harder to force out the words.

"Kurt Hummel."

The eyes would not let him go. They pinned him down like an insect and he couldn't hide – there was no place to hide – they saw right through him and illuminated all of his secret hiding places with a soft, blue light that Blaine couldn't understand because it looked and felt so different from the sharp bites of pain in his body. The eyes wanted something from him, he knew they did, and he needed to give them what they wanted if only he could figure out what it was.

"Kurt Hummel!"

But there wasn't anything to figure out. Figuring out wasn't the point at all. The point was to stand here and let those eyes see everything and be whatever Kurt was asking him to be right now at this exact moment.

Blaine had no idea there was a brick wall in his chest until it started to crack.

His eyes filled with tears and he didn't know why, what the fuck was happening, and his breath was coming in sharp gulps and he wanted to stop, to just never have to say the name again, he couldn't force it out any more, but he spoon fell once more and,

"Kurt Hummel!"

Then the tears overflowed and he was crying because the name, the name and the eyes were ricocheting around in his chest and the cracks were widening and light was shining through and God he was so afraid. What would he be – who would he be without the solid protection of the wall? But Kurt, Kurt of the eyes and the name and the weathered scars, Kurt couldn't love him through the wall. No one could love him through the wall. Bigger chunks began to crumble away and he sobbed and the final blow fell and for the last (first) time he said,

"Kurt Hummel!"

Kurt stepped away; the spoon fell to the floor and so did Blaine, sobbing because light was shining through him and his ass burned and he'd never felt so free in his life. He stared up into Kurt's eyes and Kurt looked at him and Blaine had no idea what he was thinking but it didn't matter. It wasn't his job to figure out what Kurt thought or wanted. Kurt would tell him.

But he needed to touch, he needed Kurt's body to ground him because he was crying and floating and open without the weight of that wall inside him and he had to find an anchor. He reached out for Kurt's legs, awkward with his bound hands, but Kurt stepped away.

"Please . . . Kurt . . ." he cried, still reaching.

"Straighten up," came the command from above. Blaine pulled himself back, straightened his spine, and let his hands rest together on his thighs. And that was the anchor: Kurt's voice, his commands, making the choice to simply follow them. Sobs were still breaking through his body like ocean waves, but Blaine found that his mind was quieting. Waiting. Simply waiting for Kurt.

Kurt stood and watched and Blaine didn't wonder what Kurt was thinking or whether he'd done anything right or wrong, or what was going to happen now. Kurt had asked him to kneel. He knelt.

And then, as if there'd been some kind of silent signal, Kurt suddenly fell to the floor and wrapped his arms around Blaine and the sobs came harder and Blaine didn't even notice the way his arms were pinned awkwardly between their bodies. He rested his head in the crook of his soulmate's neck; let his tears drain into Kurt's skin; felt the warmth of Kurt's arms and the soft, high, beautiful voice in his ear.

"Shhhhh. It's going to be okay now."

"You were amazing, Blaine. I knew you could do it."

"I'm not going anywhere, okay. I'm here. We're here."

Then sobs started to give way to laughter and Blaine thought he must be a little hysterical; he felt so light, almost weightless, and he needed to tell Kurt something, it was so funny and beautiful that he had to pull back and look in those eyes again. Eyes that were concerned because yeah, he was probably hysterical, but it was beautiful because he was feeling so much.

"That was my first punishment." He offered it to Kurt like a gift, still laughing through tears that seemed determined to keep falling no matter how wonderful Blaine felt. "First real punishment, anyway."

He thought maybe Kurt would laugh too, but Kurt's eyes widened and his mouth fell open and maybe tried to tilt into a smile but Blaine couldn't tell because Kurt's lips were on his, his tongue pushing into Blaine's mouth, one hand grabbing at the back of Blaine's head to pull him closer and tighter.

Blaine didn't try to be anything. He didn't hold himself back in some ideal of submissive behavior. His tongue met Kurt's in the middle and he kissed back for all he was worth, drinking in the heat and the flavor of coffee left over from a tiny shop that seemed forever ago. He licked his own way into Kurt's mouth and their lips pressed hard and hungry and desperate, tiny sounds escaping both their throats. And Kurt wasn't stopping. He pressed forward, up straighter on his knees; Blaine had to tilt his head back sharply to keep their mouths connected and he felt something brush against his arms, still bound and trapped between them. It was the rough fabric of Kurt's jeans and, under that, the strong, defined shape of Kurt's cock. Kurt's hard cock.

He almost expected Kurt to pull back then _(don't expect, feel)_ but instead Kurt pushed forward again, kissing even harder and deeper until Blaine had no choice but to submit to the ravaging mouth, and Kurt's cock rutted against Blaine's arms and the scarf that wrapped them. Hard and fast Kurt's hips moved, moaning sounds that Blaine echoed, taking his pleasure, _using_ Blaine's body for his pleasure, and that realization flew through Blaine like wildfire. He was hard in seconds. His fingers scrabbled at Kurt's pants, trying to reach for anything he could – cock, balls, the sensitive space behind. A shudder ran through his body and he prayed that today's pants were expendable because he thought he might die if Kurt didn't come.

But Kurt pulled back _(don't think, don't worry, listen, look)_ instead.

"Oh my God, I'm so sorry!"

Blaine wanted to cry. He wanted to beg Kurt not to regret what he'd done; it had been amazing and so, so hot.

"I should have undone this right away. God, are you okay?"

The scarf. Kurt was talking about the scarf. He was apologizing for not untying Blaine right away and even as he talked he pulled at the knot in the fabric and began to unwind it from Blaine's arms. Blaine breathed a sigh of relief and wrapped his arms around Kurt's neck as soon as they were free. He pulled Kurt close for another kiss. He could do that. He could do whatever he needed to do. Kurt would tell him if he went wrong.

Even with his tongue in Blaine's mouth and Blaine's fingers digging into the muscles behind his shoulder blades, Kurt had to push away the inclination to berate himself for screwing up. He knew he should stop, maybe apologize again, make sure Blaine was okay after the spanking and the weird emotional catharsis they both seemed to be having.

But it was so hot, trailing his hands down Blaine's naked back, teasing at the crack of his ass (and Kurt couldn't deny that was what he was doing, the sounds Blaine made as his fingers slipped lower each time were beyond delicious), kissing open and deep. His arms were full of naked, willing, submissive Blaine and he was so hard, and pressing himself against Blaine before had been so intensely erotic. For just a minute it would be okay to simply take. He could lose himself in the beauty of kissing and touching and wanting.

So he let his tongue reach deeper into Blaine's mouth and let his fingers trail down again and then dance to the side, over the crease where his thighs bent against his body, teasing the possibility of going further. Blaine pulled his mouth away just far enough to breathe Kurt's name against his lips. Then he pressed back again, humming a beautiful note in his throat as he took Kurt's lips and teased his own tongue against them.

Kurt suddenly needed to see; he pulled back from Blaine, who made a beautiful noise of protest but accepted, settling back into his kneeling, waiting posture, which perfectly displayed his body for his dom.

Blaine knelt and looked at Kurt in such an open, unguarded way, with maybe just a touch of shyness, and Kurt let himself stare. He didn't have a choice, really, because Blaine was beautiful. His body was hard and lean and masculine, gorgeous muscle and soft skin, dark nipples that Kurt wanted to take into his mouth just to see what kind of sounds Blaine would make when he did it.

Blaine was trembling slightly under the scrutiny but his cock was hard and dark against his belly. For a fleeting moment Kurt wondered what dominant thing he should do right now, but he squashed that thought. He just needed to follow his instincts. Plus his own dick was still straining against his pants and the sight of Blaine so turned on just made Kurt want to give him more.

The angle was all wrong for his mouth, but he reached out and ran his thumb over a nipple, and oh yes, the sound Blaine made was delicious and sent even more need spiraling through Kurt's body. He let his hand trail down into the dips between abdominal muscles, and lower, to rest again in the crease of Blaine's thigh and tease along it, closer to his cock, and then away.

"Please . . ." Blaine breathed.

"Tell me what you want," Kurt ordered.

"God, just touch me. Please Kurt."

Blaine's eyes were as soft and pleading as his tone. Kurt left his hand where it was, but reached out with the other to rest his fingertips lightly on the head of Blaine's cock, where a tiny bit of moisture was already gathered. Blaine's eyes slipped closed, his lashes were still wet and clumpy from his crying, and he sighed a quiet, "Thank you."

It was the first time Kurt had touched someone else's dick and once his hand was there he didn't want to take it away. He just wanted to feel and know and play. His fingers stroked up and down the shaft, slipping the skin over the hard strength underneath. He teased just under the head, circling one light fingertip, then slid back over the top and pinched gently. It flexed upward when he did that so he did it some more, reveling in how responsive Blaine was to his touch.

Blaine's eyes were still closed and he was moaning freely, breathing in long, shuddering inhales and exhales, but he kept his body still and relaxed for Kurt's exploration.

"Spread your legs a little bit," Kurt said, resting his hand at the base of Blaine's shaft.

Blaine shifted so his legs parted and settled back again. Kurt slid his hand lower, cupping Blaine's balls, rolling them gently inside their sac, and a deep and primal groan erupted from Blaine's throat.

"Is that good?" Kurt asked.

"Uh-huh," was all Blaine could manage.

He rolled the balls one more time, then moved the hand that still rested on Blaine's thigh to join the one on his cock and let all his fingers trail back up, over the head, then off and away. He sat back on his heels and watched as Blaine's cock throbbed gently, pushing up against the hard muscles of his abdomen. He waited.

After a moment Blaine's eyes opened and there was so much need in them that Kurt almost relented and just reached out to stroke him to orgasm. Almost. But Kurt was doing what he wanted now, so instead he smiled at Blaine and said "You can put your clothes back on."

Blaine's eyes opened wide and disbelieving and his mouth gaped just a little, but there was neither disappointment nor anger in his expression. No. The look on his face was something else entirely.

For their first Christmas after Kurt's mom died, Burt had taken him to volunteer at Lima's only homeless shelter. Kurt had been given the job of handing out presents to the children living there. One tiny girl, he remembered, had clung to her father's hand, hiding behind his leg but peeking out at a beautiful baby doll with soft blonde curls and a frilly dress. Kurt had picked it up and given it to her with a smile, but the girl hadn't taken it. She'd simply looked at it, and him, and he could see in her eyes how desperately she wanted it, but that she didn't dare trust that she'd actually be allowed to have it.

It was the exact look that Blaine was giving him now.

After a moment of silence Blaine spoke. "You said I could ask for things . . ."

"Yes," Kurt said.

"Could we just . . . maybe could we lie down, hold each other for a while."

He should have remembered that, Kurt berated himself. Everyone knew subs needed physical contact and comfort after an intense scene or punishment. Blaine was looking a little nervous so Kurt smiled at him. "Sure, of course. Do you want to put your clothes on first or would you rather stay – like that?"

"I'd like to stay like this, if it's okay."

"Yeah," Kurt nodded.

Kurt stood up and reached out his hand to help Blaine. But Blaine grabbed his wrist instead, where his cuff was still buckled over his mark. "Can I . . . ?" he began, caressing the leather with his fingers.

Kurt nodded, and Blaine slowly turned Kurt's arm over, undid the buckle, and slid the cuff over Kurt's hand. He set it on the floor and gently caressed the welts, looking up at Kurt with an unspoken plea on his face. And maybe the idea of a psychic connection between soulmates wasn't hogwash after all because Kurt knew exactly what Blaine was asking for.

"Blaine Anderson," he said with a smile, reaching out to push sweat-damp tendrils of black curl off of Blaine's forehead. "Blaine Anderson. Blaine Anderson."

After the third time Blaine took his hand and pulled himself up off the floor. "Thank you," he said simply, then led the way across the darkening room and down the little hall to his bedroom.

It was probably a lovely room, but Kurt couldn't see anything beyond the bed on which he was about to lie down with naked, beautiful Blaine. He kicked his shoes off and went straight to the bed, climbing up, stretching out, and reaching a hand out to Blaine who still hovered in the doorway.

Blaine moved quickly then, climbing up and stretching out alongside Kurt with a sigh, resting his head on Kurt's chest.

Blaine really did seem to only want to cuddle. His cock was hard against Kurt's thigh but he made no move to thrust or rub it there, he simply lay in Kurt's arms, one arm thrown across Kurt's waist well above where Kurt was also still hard in his jeans.

Kurt should have stopped. He'd as much as told Blaine he wouldn't be coming, but he was sixteen and in bed with a man – his soulmate – and he was still so turned on. Plus he was following his instincts now, and if those instincts seemed to be coming from his dick, well, that didn't make them any less right. He reached his free hand to tilt Blaine's face up and kissed him again, slipping so easily now into Blaine's open mouth, and then slid his hand down Blaine's muscled arm, over his hard abs and down one thigh and up the other, teasing around Blaine's cock without quite touching it. Blaine did thrust then, pushing against Kurt's leg ever so slightly and whimpering with the effort of holding back.

He shouldn't do it. He really had no intention of making Blaine come at that moment; it seemed too close to his punishment and probably blurred the lines between punishment and reward in some way that Domming for Dummies would certainly disapprove of. But, really, if he couldn't touch his sub's dick when he was hard and naked and practically begging for it, when could he?

That was enough rationalization for Kurt. He let his fingers trail up over Blaine's cock, oh so lightly, and Blaine moaned out loud and rolled away to lie flat on his back, legs slightly spread and open to Kurt's touch. He could see the muscles in Blaine's ass tense and relax with the effort of not pushing up into the teasing hand. There couldn't possibly be anything in the universe hotter than that, and Kurt's erection throbbed with renewed energy.

"Kurt," Blaine panted.

"Hmmm?"

"You should probably stop."

Kurt's fingers kept moving feather-light along Blaine's twitching length. "Why should I stop?"

"Because you don't want me to come. And I don't want to disobey you. Not now."

And that was even hotter. Kurt was starting to realize that he was going to have to come up with an entirely new scale to measure arousal.

He leaned in, teased his lips against Blaine's ear, and whispered, "Do you have any lubricant?"

Blaine's eyes flew open and Kurt could see hope there. He had no idea what Blaine was hoping for, but he seemed to be doing okay so far so he didn't try too hard to figure it out.

"Night stand," was all Blaine said.

Kurt had to reach over Blaine to get to the bedside table, and when he rested his weight on Blaine's torso to scrabble in the drawer Blaine hummed a long, slow note that vibrated his body under Kurt's. Lube in hand, Kurt pushed himself back to his side.

Blaine stared at him like nothing in the world could persuade him to look away. He watched Kurt squeeze some lube onto his hand and his eyes widened as Kurt reached out, slid his palm over Blaine's erection slowly, once, to spread the lube, then began to pump hard and fast, jerking Blaine at light speed toward orgasm.

"Oh God! Kurt . . ."

"Don't come. Tell me when to stop."

Blaine moaned and gasped, one hand clenching at the duvet, the other reaching for Kurt, grabbing at flesh where his fingers found Kurt's shoulder. He lasted longer than Kurt expected, exhaling on long cries, one of which finally ended in, "Stop . . . Stop . . ."

Kurt pulled his hand away and watched as Blaine's cock thrust desperately in the air. He was still moaning wantonly and it was overwhelmingly erotic watching Blaine struggle to control his body. Kurt's was pretty sure he'd never been harder in his life and he was pretty sure this was going to go farther than he'd intended because walking away in the state he was in was so not an option any more.

When Blaine's body finally began to settle and his breathing slowed from desperate pants to a more normal pattern Kurt reached out and began again with firm, swift strokes of Blaine's rock hard erection.

"Shit! Fuck . . ." Blaine's body arched up and the hand on Kurt's shoulder tightened spasmodically; Kurt was pretty sure he was going to have a lovely bruise on his shoulder tomorrow. His other hand slammed against the headboard, grappling for purchase where there was none to be had.

"Tell me when," Kurt commanded.

Blaine seemed beyond moaning now, his mouth opened silently and he seemed to be holding his breath – there was no sound at all but the slick squelch of Kurt's hand dragging Blaine back to the edge of orgasm with relentless drive.

"Now! Stop!" Blaine barely whispered, and again he pumped and fucked upwards when Kurt let go, cock throbbing rhythmically against his belly, and Kurt's cock was throbbing in sympathy, almost as desperate for release as Blaine. Impulsively, he pressed his mouth to Blaine's, needing a more immediate physical connection, absorbing Blaine's moans and straining and need with his own body.

After a moment Blaine pulled back, breathing again in short, sharp gasps, and when he opened his eyes to look at Kurt there was no pleading or anger or even really frustration in his expression. What Kurt found in Blaine's eyes looked very much like awe.

And suddenly Kurt felt so right that it didn't seem like a big decision at all to say, "Take my pants off."

There was no question that Kurt was succeeding in surprising Blaine today, because for the third time that afternoon Blaine gaped at him with wide, shocked eyes that he then quickly closed tight. But Kurt was on a roll and though he obviously had Blaine off-balance, Blaine seemed to be very okay with it.

"What are you waiting for?" he demanded.

Blaine opened his eyes again and his hand, still tight on Kurt's shoulder, loosened just a tiny bit. "I'm trying not to come," he confessed.

Kurt arched an eyebrow at him in his best demanding diva look. "All I keep hearing is what a perfect sub you are," he said. "So get yourself under control and get my freaking pants off!"

Kurt didn't know where all this out-there dominance was coming from but if it was half as hot for Blaine as it was for him, then Blaine really was a perfect sub; Kurt was about to come in his pants just from hearing himself.

Blaine jumped to obey then, shuffling down to place himself between Kurt's legs and pulling open the button and zipper on his jeans. He tugged the pants down, but only the pants because Blaine always obeyed orders exactly, and off, taking Kurt's socks with them. He laid the pants out on the bed next to them and knelt again, making a perfect picture of a submissive there between Kurt's legs with his head bowed and his dick hard.

"Now the underwear," Kurt directed.

Blaine still looked shell-shocked, but the ghost of a smile was beginning to tug at his lips. He lifted Kurt's briefs carefully over his erection and slid them down and off to rest next to the jeans. Kurt, figuring he might as well go all in, popped the first two buttons of his shirt then pushed up enough to pull it over his head. Blaine didn't move, but he looked like he wanted to eat Kurt alive and his cock kept twitching and pulsing.

Kurt supposed he should have felt exposed, laid out naked and hard in front of Blaine, but points for instinct because it felt so right that he didn't hesitate to grab the lube he'd used earlier and hold the little bottle out to Blaine, who didn't seem to be able to drag his eyes away from Kurt's naked form.

"Take it Blaine. I want your hand. Make me come." He managed to keep his voice steady and Blaine finally reached for the lube, clutching at Kurt's hand for just a second as he did. They were both trembling in anticipation now as Blaine slicked his own hand up then hesitated, staring at Kurt with a question in his eyes, as if he couldn't quite believe he was being allowed to do this.

"Go ahead," Kurt said.

He meant to keep his eyes open and watch his perfect sub give him his first ever hand job, but at the first touch he had to close them, just to let himself feel. Blaine's hand moved slowly but firmly up and down his length and Kurt had been up and down so much this afternoon, building and backing away, that when the pleasure swelled out to encompass his whole body he simply surrendered to it.

"God, why does that feel so different when someone else does it?" he asked.

Blaine may have chuckled a bit – Kurt's breath was too loud in his own ears for him to be sure. "Men have been asking themselves that for probably a million years," he said, and sped up his strokes, his pants coming in time with Kurt's. When Kurt could no longer hold back soft, breathy moans of pleasure Blaine moaned as well, almost as if Kurt's pleasure was his own. The intensity seemed to build past the point of endurance; the heat curling in his belly was burning, he had no idea how he hadn't come already, and Blaine's caress felt like strength and comfort and love.

When Kurt was at the peak, when he could see and hear and feel the orgasm waiting to smash into his body, Blaine took the smallest of pauses, just letting him hang for a brief moment of forever, then with a twist of wrist and a swipe of thumb Kurt fell over the edge; he stiffened and cried out as waves of pleasure rolled and twisted and spasmed through him. He could hear Blaine's breath, harsh and heavy, and now it was his turn to grab at the duvet as his release splashed and dripped onto his body in pulse after pulse.

Oh, he was definitely going to need a new scale.

When he finally came back to the world, limp against the mattress, Blaine was gone, but he reappeared in a moment with a damp cloth in his hand and began to gently wipe Kurt's torso clean. After everything that had happened, this small service was what finally brought home to Kurt that they'd done it. Somehow they'd fumbled their way into their roles as dom and sub. They still needed to talk – there was so, so much to say – but at some fundamental level all the important decisions had been made.

Blaine folded the washcloth carefully and set it on the bedside table. Still panting softly, Kurt held out his arms and Blaine came back to snuggle into Kurt's side. He was still hard, but he didn't ask for anything more, just settled with his cock cradled between his own body and Kurt's. He seemed almost as limp and satiated as Kurt himself, which Kurt's pleasure-numb brain couldn't quite figure out. Oh well, one more thing to talk about tomorrow.

Blaine moved slightly, tilting his head up to look at Kurt, and Kurt managed to lift his head enough to press his lips to Blaine's, and let his tongue slip teasingly past Blaine's lips in a revisiting of their very first kiss.

"If you ask me," Blaine whispered as they pulled apart, "I don't think you're going to have any problem in your dom classes."

Kurt giggled, and Blaine gave him that bright-as-sunshine smile then settled on his chest again, apparently very pleased with himself.

The kissing and laughing seemed to get the blood flowing to Kurt's brain again, even as Blaine settled heavier against his body. He reached up and stroked gently at Blaine's curls and marveled at the feeling of Blaine's cock softening against his leg in time to the deepening of his breathing. Somehow, despite being teased and denied while he gave Kurt his mind-blowing orgasm, Blaine had drifted right into sleep.

It was almost fully dark now and Kurt waited until Blaine seemed completely out before he shifted himself out from under his sub, who clutched at his pillow as he moved, and climbed out of the bed. He padded in the dimness out of the bedroom and down the hall. It was strange to walk naked around someone else's house, feeling the air brush against his still-sensitive skin, but putting on his clothes would have been silly.

He hovered for a moment on the threshold of the living room and surveyed the scene of their struggle, items strewn across the floor like casualties of battle, lit faintly by the last of the sun coming through the thin curtains at the west-facing windows. Blaine's clothes and shoes shoved under the table by the door. Kurt's scarf and cuff on the floor by the kitchen, with the wooden spoon discarded nearby. A few steps further and he could see the wrapped box containing the black cuff in the corner of the kitchen where it had fallen after it bounced against the refrigerator.

They were such tiny things, but seeing them there where they'd been left in fear or anger or lust, somehow illustrated in ways Kurt hadn't fully accepted the enormity of what had happened to him in the past three days. Three days! Just last Thursday Kurt had woken up and gone to school a clueless teenager dreaming of romance and hoping for a Glee solo and enjoying the fact that for some reason the jocks seemed to have forgotten how to torment him. Now here he was naked in Blaine's apartment, Blaine who he'd spanked and teased (which had been hotter than he'd ever imagined and made Kurt suspect he'd found his first kink), Blaine who'd made him come like he'd never known it was possible to come, Blaine who was asleep in his bed right now waiting for Kurt to come back and hold him. He was a dom. He was Blaine's dom. He would be Blaine's dom for the rest of his life.

He was trembling so hard that he had to sit down on the couch, which was probably completely unsanitary in his naked state, but his legs weren't going to hold him up much longer and he really just needed to take a minute to panic. There was no one to tell, no one to go to for advice or just for a shoulder to cry on, and he felt completely alone.

But that was wrong, he told himself. He wasn't alone. He had Blaine. And though they were still figuring things out Kurt knew that being soulmates meant that Blaine wasn't just his perfect sexual partner, he was the perfect emotional partner as well. Blaine was meant to be the love of Kurt's life and his best friend. They may be baby-stepping their way there, but eventually they would be each other's everything.

He pushed himself resolutely from the couch and made his way to the kitchen, picking up their clutter as he passed through the room. He set their cuffs side-by-side on the coffee table, his own bright and new next to Blaine's more time-worn one. The spoon went into the sink. The slightly battered box with the new black cuff joined the others on the table, his scarf he hung with his jacket in the little closet. He retrieved his cell phone from the kitchen counter, thumbed it on and selected a name from his contacts.

"Hello future New York roommate, what can I do for you tonight?" Rachel answered, chipper as always. Hearing her voice was good. There was nothing like a little Rachel Berry insanity to make him feel like the world hadn't completely tipped off its axis.

"Hey Rach. Okay, don't freak out."

"Oh God, what happened?! Is Finn okay?"

"Nothing happened; everything's fine," he reassured her. "I just need you to cover for me tonight."

He was glad he'd called from the kitchen because if he'd been in the bedroom Rachel's scream would definitely have woken Blaine.

"Oh my God! Kurt! You're spending the night with him?! Oh my God this is amazing . . ."

"Okay, stop!" Kurt pleaded. "Yes, I need to stay here tonight and I'll tell my dad the truth tomorrow but for now I can't take an argument with him. So I just want to tell him I'm with you, okay?"

"Okay? Of course it's okay! Like I would ever stand between you and sex."

"It's not about . . ." but of course it kind of was, so Kurt trailed off and had to endure another ear-splitting squeal when Rachel realized she'd been right.

"This is so exciting Kurt! You deserve every second of it. Of course I'll cover for you."

"You're not hanging with Finn tonight?"

"No, he's spending the night with Noah, which I was very upset about because I really wanted to see that new horror movie with him, but now I see that fate had a much better use for me tonight and I'm just so . . ."

"Okay, okay Rach," Kurt interrupted, "I totally owe you. But I have to call my dad and get back to . . ."

"Say no more," Rachel said. "I'm here for you. Go have fun." She giggled just a little at the end of that but said goodbye and hung up.

The second call was going to be harder. Kurt hated lying to his dad. But he told himself it was just for tonight. There was no way he could leave Blaine after everything they'd been through, and there was no way his dad would let him stay, even with a truthful explanation, so he really didn't have a choice.

As luck would have it, Carole answered the phone. It was easier to lie to Carole than it would have been to his dad – Burt had some kind of sixth sense when it came to knowing when something was going on with Kurt – and not only did he manage to get through saying he would be staying with Rachel, he even managed to mention that he'd be bringing a friend over for brunch the next day. His dad would have been all over that, but Carole took it in stride and started calculating how many eggs and pieces of bread she would need.

Phone calls complete, Kurt picked up the pile of Blaine's clothes, leaving his shoes by the door, and headed back into the bedroom. Blaine was right where Kurt had left him, snuggled up to the pillow Kurt's head had been on, his loud breathing just shy of being snores. Kurt folded the clothes neatly on the dresser, added his own to the pile, then climbed back into bed, managing to wriggle himself under the covers.

When he tried to take back his pillow Blaine roused just enough to slither under the blanket himself and snuggle back up to Kurt.

"Where' d you go?" he murmured.

"Just had to make a phone call. Go back to sleep." Kurt wrapped his arms around Blaine again. It wasn't late, probably not even 7:00 yet, but he felt so drained that he knew he'd have no trouble falling asleep. Blaine was already out again, his body limp and heavy against Kurt's. Blaine's weight pushed down on him like a physical reminder of responsibility and duty, but it was also the weight of commitment and partnership.

There were discussions and negotiations still to be had, but if today had proven anything it was that he'd been right the very first day. He really could give Blaine what he needed. He'd just had to figure out that what Blaine said he wanted and what he needed could be two very different things. His last thought, as he drifted away from the waking world, was to wonder if the same was true for himself.


	11. Chapter Eleven

Blaine woke up slowly and gently, as he always did when there wasn't an alarm involved. The weak light in the room confused him at first. He wasn't sure if he'd slept all night or only for a few moments. He reached for his phone but it wasn't on the night stand where he usually kept it. So it must still be in his pants. In the living room. Where he'd left them when . . .

With a tiny gasp he rolled over to check the other side of the bed.

Kurt was still there.

He was asleep on his side, facing away from Blaine. Facing the window which Blaine's still muzzy brain finally remembered opened east. So it must be pre-dawn light then that bathed Kurt in a soft, misty glow. The duvet was bunched down around Kurt's thighs exposing most of Kurt's body. It wasn't overly warm in the room and Blaine realized with a rush of pleasure that Kurt had probably pushed it off in reaction to their combined body heat in the bed. The intimacy of the image made him smile.

Blaine's body – so expertly denied last night – responded immediately to the sight of Kurt's naked form, and maybe it was that, the low-level desperation that still simmered in his brain and body, that let Blaine finally just take in the entirety of the beauty of the sixteen-year-old in his bed.

Blaine knew, on the logical side of his brain, that desiring Kurt really didn't have anything to do with his youth. The soulmate bond was what fueled his attraction and made Blaine respond to whatever Kurt happened to be. If he'd been fifty years old Blaine would have found graying temples and crows' feet as overwhelmingly sexy as he now found Kurt's bare chest and smooth, unmarked skin. But he couldn't quite shake the feeling that he should appreciate Kurt in spite of his youth, never because of it. In all the things they'd done together so far he'd forced himself to keep his attention to safe areas. Kurt's eyes, his lips, the soft caress of his hands. Even last night, while he stroked Kurt to orgasm for the first time, he'd looked at Kurt's face and resolutely ignored his narrow hips and the sparseness of hair around his cock.

But yesterday they'd come to an understanding and Kurt had cemented it by controlling the most intimate of things: he'd made Blaine's body his own. He'd denied Blaine partly because it turned him on, of course, but also because he'd taken the time to look at Blaine, to look and understand, maybe in ways that Blaine didn't even fully understand himself, how much Blaine had wanted it. And making Kurt come while he was hovering so close to an orgasm he wouldn't be allowed to have had been its own kind of weird bliss. Not better than actually coming, but not exactly worse, either. It had felt like Kurt had marked him somehow. A mark in the shape of Blaine's hard cock, unsatisfied and yearning over the evidence of Kurt's release.

Yesterday Kurt had seen things in Blaine that he'd been hiding from everyone, even himself. He'd seen them and embraced them. It was starting to seem silly and cowardly for Blaine to blind himself to parts of Kurt just because they happened to belong to a teenager. So now he looked, really looked, at the boy laid out next to him, shoulders and back slowly expanding and contracting with his breath, pale skin illuminated by pale light.

He looked at Kurt's neck and what could be seen of his jaw, which was not at all stubbly even after a day and night away from home. The line of that jaw, so clearly masculine and yet so perfectly smooth - how could he not let himself enjoy the odd contradiction? It was part of what made Kurt Kurt.

Kurt's already broad shoulders and long, graceful limbs still had a bit of adolescent gangliness to them, but there was no doubt that he actually_would_ be buff when he grew up. The wiry muscles under his skin were already starting to taken on a definition and shape that made Blaine want to run his tongue over them, preferably when Kurt was so turned on that they were shivering with pleasure.

Blaine's cock was starting to ache and he hadn't even gotten to the way Kurt's torso narrowed down to his so-slender waist, or his ass, completely on display in this position. His ass was tight and round and Blaine could imagine much too easily how it would feel under his clenching fingers as Kurt thrust in and out of his body in long, gorgeous, agonizing strokes. As he made Blaine beg for each little taste of pleasure . . .

Oh, God, fantasizing was not a good idea in his condition. He was horny enough without torturing himself like that. Two days ago he wouldn't have hesitated to take himself in hand and stroke to release and the fact that he didn't even consider it was a mark of how attuned his submission was to Kurt's dominance. His hips did rock gently forward though, without permission from his brain, and Blaine threw caution to the wind and slid over to wrap himself around Kurt, spooning the sleeping boy with his body. He really meant to try to go back to sleep, but the warmth of Kurt's skin against his own, the flat firmness of the abdomen under his hand, the soft, plush feel of the ass against his erection: all these things combined were just enough to subvert his best intentions and he couldn't resist rocking his needy cock gently between their bodies.

After a few moments the tempo of Kurt's breathing changed and Blaine realized he must be awake. He tried to feel guilty for rousing Kurt, but the excitement that coursed through his body wouldn't really let him.

"Rub up against me all you want," came the sleep-roughened voice, "but you're not coming yet."

The morning hoarseness in Kurt's voice only ramped Blaine up further. Now that his dom was awake, Blaine let his hand roam over Kurt's chest and pressed his cock more firmly into the soft give of his ass. Kurt didn't stop him, so he went further, teasing his lips over the back of Kurt's neck and down to the top of his spine, tongue slipping out here and there to kiss Kurt's skin. He felt desperate for contact with Kurt's body and it turned him on in the most fantastic way to have all his senses overwhelmed by his soulmate.

"What are you doing?" Kurt asked, turning his head to look back at Blaine with sleepy, amused eyes. Blaine took the opportunity to nuzzle against Kurt's jaw, letting himself enjoy the smooth, perfect skin there.

"Obeying orders," he said finally, the pumping rhythm of his hips never faltering.

"What?"

"You said," Blaine answered, now nipping at Kurt's shoulder, "to rub up against you as much as I want. And I think we've already established that I'm very obedient."

"Isn't that just completely frustrating?" Kurt asked as Blaine's exhales began to hum their way into becoming moans.

"Yes," Blaine said. But he didn't stop.

Kurt must have liked what he'd heard in Blaine's voice because he pushed back with his ass and a sharp groan rumbled through Blaine's chest as the pressure on his cock increased. This time when his hand caressed down Kurt's body it encountered his cock, semi-erect now, and Blaine just kept going, sliding his fingers over the head, down the shaft then back up. Stroking Kurt's cock felt almost as good as stroking himself, and Kurt sighed in pleasure as Blaine's fingers danced along his hardening length.

"Kurt?"

"Hmmm?"

"Can I . . . I really need to make you come." Blaine was a little surprised by how true this was. His whole body was tensed like a coiled spring and he knew he wasn't going to come yet but it seemed very important to him that Kurt should. He felt like he could hold out, as long as he could watch Kurt find the ecstasy that he was forbidden.

"I don't know," Kurt answered. "I'm still kind of tired and, you know, it makes such a mess."

Blaine could tell Kurt was teasing him, but he jumped at the opportunity to suggest, "Well, there are ways to do it that wouldn't necessarily make a big mess."

"Like what?" Kurt asked in a light voice. Blaine was pretty sure Kurt knew what he meant and his heart sped up when he realized that Kurt wasn't going to shoot him down right off the bat.

"I could, ummm, use my mouth."

He held his breath while Kurt turned to look at him again and made a show of thinking it over.

"I'm not ready to let you come yet. Can you handle that?"

Blaine's heart leapt and he nodded emphatically.

Kurt slowly scooted onto his back, his body once again spread out for Blaine, dusted shades of gold by the slowly increasing light filling the room. For a second Blaine felt struck dumb with awe. Kurt was giving himself to Blaine in such an intimate way and he shook a little with the need to prove worthy. He wanted so much. He felt like he could crawl inside Kurt's skin and still not feel like he was close enough.

He moved to kneel between Kurt's legs, as he had last night, and Kurt pushed up onto his elbows to watch with dark eyes that had no trace of sleepiness left in them. Blaine bowed forward and buried his nose in the crease of Kurt's thigh. He could feel Kurt's cock against the side of his face, jerking at the contact, and his balls so close to Blaine's lips. He drew a deep breath. He just needed to fill his lungs with Kurt's scent and he didn't even try to suppress the shudder of desire that shook through his body. He wanted Kurt to see how this affected him. How Kurt's gift made him burn.

And Kurt must have liked it too because he moaned low and deep as he watched Blaine worship him. "God, you're beautiful," he said, and the words thrilled through Blaine as strongly as the physical contact had. He took a few breaths, wrestling his body under control, before lifting his head to begin. He started slowly, resting the flat of his tongue at the base of Kurt's shaft and running it up to just under the head and then pointing it to lick at Kurt's frenulum.

Kurt went stiff from head to toe. "Oh my God! I totally get what the big deal is about this. That's incredible!"

Blaine lifted his head long enough to say, "Just wait," then he took the head of Kurt's cock between his lips and sucked gently, swirling his tongue as he did. Kurt gasped and fell down flat on the bed again, throwing one arm over his eyes. Blaine threw his own arm across Kurt's hips to hold him down. This was Kurt's first blow job and Blaine knew that even if it was only okay Kurt wasn't going to be able to control the urge to thrust. And this was going to be way more than okay. Because Blaine certainly knew how to give a blow job.

He made one last swipe of his tongue over the head, then opened his mouth and slowly engulfed Kurt's cock in the warm heat of his mouth.

"Shit!" Kurt cried, trying to push up into Blaine's mouth just as Blaine had predicted. Blaine felt a surge of pride at actually having made Kurt curse. He went to work in earnest now, using every trick he knew, not teasing but building carefully, backing off when things got too intense, and building again, doing everything he could to keep Kurt's body flooded with sensation without making him feel desperate. The taste and smell and feel of Kurt's flesh kept Blaine's own need always present but somehow muted by his focus on his dom.

Like the night before, Kurt didn't even try to be quiet. He gave voice to every sensation, moans and cries and gasps that sometimes managed to form words ("Holy shit," "Oh, God, Blaine," and once even something that might have been the start of a "fuck") but were mostly incoherent. Every sound, words or not, went straight to Blaine's own cock which danced and flexed and throbbed.

When Kurt finally lost words altogether and simply moaned on each long exhale Blaine began to pump his mouth up and down faster, taking Kurt as deep as he possibly could manage. Kurt's moans became short, sharp "hahs" that went higher and higher in his register as he got closer and closer to orgasm. And with an extra-strong suck and a perfect swirl of tongue Blaine could feel Kurt coming. One flailing hand found Blaine's head and tightened in his hair and Blaine really didn't need that extra stimulation. Holding himself back was hard enough with Kurt's cock shivering in his mouth, pumping warm come against his throat, beautiful sounds of pleasure echoing in his ears. He knew exactly what Kurt was feeling and knowing made his own lack of that same pleasure all the more intense.

Kurt finally collapsed, panting like he'd run a marathon. Blaine was panting too; gently releasing Kurt's slowly softening cock and letting his head fall limply on Kurt's thigh. They both lay in silence for a minute, gasping, Kurt with the force of his release and Blaine with the force of his denial. When he finally trusted his voice, he gasped out between breaths, "Can I just say . . . your speed . . . is turning out to be . . . a lot faster . . . than I expected."

Kurt burst into surprised laughter and Blaine groaned. "Please don't laugh. At this point I think just the mattress shaking could make me come."

"Come here," Kurt said, and Blaine climbed up the bed to lie on his side next to Kurt, far enough away that there was no chance of his dick pressing against any part of Kurt's body. Kurt turned so they lay face to face, smiling sleepily.

"If you're very good at my house today maybe I'll do that to you when we come back," he said as he stroked his fingers down Blaine's chest.

Blaine really needed to just accept that Kurt was going to be endlessly surprising. Because gaping like a fish was not in any way sexy. "How did I ever think you wouldn't be able to dominate me?" he asked.

Kurt slid his hand lower and dragged his fingers down along Blaine's cock to tease at his balls. Blaine's breath caught in his throat at the gentle, aching touch.

"That's for underestimating me," Kurt said, nestling his head deeper into his pillow and letting his eyes slip closed in post-orgasmic relaxation.

It felt like a very big step for Blaine to say, "I think I've underestimated you a _lot_."

Kurt must have heard the subtext because his eyes opened again and fixed on Blaine's with a sleepy intensity. "Are you asking me to tease you?" His tone was light but Blaine could feel the weight behind the question.

His answer was simple but equally weighty. "Yes," he breathed.

Kurt reached out again and let his fingers dance over Blaine's balls and tap their way up and down his shaft, pinching gently at the head like he'd done the night before. Blaine closed his eyes and just let himself float in the spiraling, all-encompassing pleasure Kurt's touch sent pulsing through his body. His dick, and Kurt's fingers, felt like the absolute center of the universe and he had no idea how he could crave it so much when he knew it would end in frustration. But even the thought of that frustration seemed to turn him on more. The idea that Kurt could control his body in this way felt dangerously like a dream come true.

Kurt's fingers began to move more and more slowly, then drifted to a stop, his hand cupping Blaine's shaft and eventually relaxing open and heavy. Blaine let himself come back to earth enough to turn his head and look at his soulmate.

Kurt had fallen back to sleep.

Blaine lay there, with blood pulsing rhythmically through his cock and his orgasm hovering so close, and God, the sight of Kurt asleep like that was almost more than he could handle. It was like the perfect mind fuck, that Kurt had let Blaine blow him and now, satisfied, had drifted to sleep, with the weight of his hand making sure Blaine continued to ache for him. Lying there under Kurt's hand Blaine had never felt more owned in his life. He would have been happy to stay there simmering in submission and arousal until Kurt woke up again, but eventually Kurt's hand contracted sharply in his sleep and Blaine realized he was flirting with disaster. He refused to come until Kurt gave him permission. A little bit of frustration (oh, who was he kidding – a whole hell of a lot of frustration) was nothing compared to making Kurt happy.

Reluctantly, he moved Kurt's hand off his body to rest on the mattress between them and slipped out of the bed. He'd fallen asleep hard last night, but he'd been emotionally exhausted. There was no way he was going to drift off after this morning's activity. He and his dick would go make some coffee. Which wasn't anywhere near as good as an orgasm, but would have to suffice.

When Kurt woke for the second time that morning he was alone, Blaine's place on the bed occupied by a pair of pajama pants, an unopened toothbrush, a washcloth and a hand towel. Kurt couldn't help smiling at the evidence of Blaine's consideration. Perfect sub in more ways than one.

He took a moment to make sure he wasn't going to have another freak out (after all, he'd taken yet another unexpected sexual step) but the uppermost thought in his mind seemed to be that he was going to have to make Blaine wake him up every morning with a blow job. Which was terribly cliché, but now he understood the reason for the cliché. Who the heck wouldn't want to wake up that way if they had the chance? And he hadn't been kidding about returning the favor after their visit with his family. He wasn't even nervous about doing it. He very much wanted to hear the noises Blaine would make with Kurt's mouth on him after two days of teasing.

And speaking of teasing – his decision to deny Blaine right after the spanking had been right in so many more ways than he'd ever expected. Clearly Blaine loved it – Kurt could tell because he hadn't once asked _when_ Kurt planned to let him come, even when he'd talked about blowing him later, and Kurt had never imagined how erotic it would be to make Blaine serve him while he waited for Kurt to grant him release. Kurt had teased Blaine about their soulmate bond, but now he understood exactly what the dictionary had meant about a perfect emotional, intellectual and sexual match. It made him wonder what other fantasies Blaine had that would turn out to be intensely hot for him as well.

A sound from the front of the apartment pulled him out of his thoughts and he grabbed his phone to check the time. Then he kicked off the covers, climbed into the too-short pajamas, and headed to the bathroom.

Blaine hadn't provided a shirt and really, it shouldn't have felt awkward after everything they'd done to walk out into Blaine's living room half-dressed. Blaine had already seen his chest. He'd touched it. He'd cleaned come off of it for God's sake. Still, Kurt managed to find a way to worry about how Blaine would react to the sight of him shirtless.

He didn't have to worry. The sight of _Blaine_ shirtless put all thoughts of himself out of Kurt's head. Blaine was sitting on a tall stool at the kitchen island, reading the newspaper and sipping at a cup of coffee. Kurt waited until he put the coffee down, which gave him a chance to appreciate the way the muscles of his back moved over his bones as he lifted and lowered the cup.

When the coffee was safe on the counter Kurt slipped up and wrapped his arms around Blaine, who jumped a little but then leaned back into his embrace.

"Good morning, sleepyhead," he said, turning his head so that he could nuzzle against Kurt's cheek. "If I'd known you were awake I'd have brought you coffee in bed."

"You don't have to serve me all the time, you know," Kurt said, trailing little kisses along Blaine's jaw and enjoying the taste of the stubble against his tongue.

"But I like it. It makes me happy." As if to demonstrate, he extricated himself from Kurt's arms and hopped down from the stool to pour a cup for him.

"Are you okay?" Kurt asked as he continued to savor the sight of Blaine's naked torso.

"What do you mean?"

Kurt shrugged. "Yesterday was kind of intense."

Blaine brought him a cup and set the sugar and cream on the counter. "Yesterday was incredible, Kurt." He moved closer and wrapped his arms around Kurt's waist so that their naked chests were pressed together. "Yesterday changed my life. You changed my life."

Kurt felt himself grinning and bit into his lower lip in an effort to control it. "You changed my life too, you know."

"Wow. I know I give a good blow job but life changing?"

Kurt swatted his ass playfully. "You know that's not what I meant."

"Ouch!" Blaine grabbed his butt and stared reprovingly at Kurt. "Recovery time!"

"Please, you barely felt that spoon."

"Are you kidding? It was the spoon that did the life changing. Someday when we have our first place together I'm going to frame that spoon and hang it on the wall."

_"Our first place"_ just dropped in there so casually make Kurt's heart turn upside-down. "I'm pretty sure a framed wooden spoon will never be part of any décor that I'd approve," Kurt said. "Besides, you have to get past my dad first."

Blaine groaned. "Right. So how'd you get him to let you stay over last night?"

Kurt took a sip of his hot coffee. "I didn't. I told him I was staying at Rachel's house. But I'm going to tell him the truth today."

"And there's another thing he'll have to hate me for."

Kurt took Blaine's hand and slotted their fingers together. "He's not going to hate you. It might take him a while to get used to the idea, but more than anything my dad wants me to be happy. And you're my soulmate. We're going to be together for the rest of our lives. Everyone just has to accept that." He smiled and tugged Blaine back against his body. "My family is your family now. They're going to love you. You're going to love them. You're especially going to love Carole's French toast casserole."

Blaine tried to smile back but it was a pretty pitiful effort. "So I guess that's my cue to tell you that I washed your socks and underwear and by the time you get out of the shower they should be dry. I didn't dare touch your pants and shirt, though."

Yep. Perfect sub.

Forty-five minutes later they were both showered and dressed and as ready as they would ever be to face whatever brunch was going to bring. Kurt came out of the bathroom after a final attempt to make himself presentable without any of his usual products to find Blaine kneeling next to the sofa, both their cuffs in his hands. He pulled himself up straight in his best serious dom posture and went to stand in front of his sub. Blaine looked up and Kurt couldn't help thinking that if Rachel could see this she'd have a whole new definition of eyes shining with submission. He smiled down at Blaine and held out his left arm.

Blaine set his own cuff on the ground and slipped Kurt's onto his wrist. He tightened the buckle then held his battered cuff out to Kurt.

Kurt shook his head. He picked up the box that held the black cuff and presented it to Blaine with a flourish.

Blaine knew what was inside the box, of course, but he gasped when he got the lid off and revealed it. "It's beautiful, Kurt."

"Really? I know it's kind of simple."

"I love it." The way Blaine looked at Kurt then made him think that going back to bed was a much better idea than any stupid brunch with his parents. "You don't understand," Blaine said. "To have a black cuff – it just means so much to a sub." Blaine struggled to find the right words. "It's like, you dream about it from the time you get marked. Because it means that you're safe. You're home."

Blaine lifted the black leather from the box and held it out to Kurt with shaking hands. Kurt took it and slid it onto Blaine's right wrist, buckling the cuff. Blaine's hands fell back onto his thighs and for a fleeting moment Kurt wished he was naked; he couldn't wait to see Blaine wearing nothing but the shining black leather that proved beyond a shadow of a doubt that Blaine was 100% his.

"Are you ready for this?" he asked, holding out his hand. Blaine took it and Kurt pulled him up to stand and kissed him gently. When Blaine's tongue touched his lips, though, he pulled back.

"Probably not the best idea to get you all worked up before you have to meet my dad," he said ruefully.

Blaine nodded, but let his lips linger chastely on Kurt's one more time.

"Thank you," he said. "For everything."

Kurt took his hand, shouldered his bag, and led the way out to the car.


	12. Chapter Twelve

Before today, Kurt had never really paid much attention to his front door. It was just a door, much like every other door on the block, dark wood, decorative, bas-relief panels, and little windows near the top. But standing in front of the door that morning with Blaine's sweaty hand clutched in his, the concept of "threshold" had never been so clear to him. On this side of the door he and Blaine were still safely anonymous. There was no one who could judge them or make assumptions. As far as anyone else was concerned Kurt was just a recently-marked kid struggling to adjust to his new dom emotions and hormones and Blaine was just a hot substitute teacher who would never consider doing anything improper with one of his students.

But once they passed through that door everything changed. Inside Kurt's house they would no longer be their own little secret. People would know. Just two people, but the most important two people outside of Kurt & Blaine themselves. Kurt felt like they were about to walk into a spotlight to be judged. Once they crossed that threshold there was no going back.

"I know this was my idea, but we can still change our minds about it," he said, staring at the door like he was waiting for it to tell him what to do.

Blaine pulled at his hand to make Kurt look at him. "What are you afraid of? Specifically," he asked.

Kurt scanned Blaine's face, but though he definitely looked nervous, he didn't seem like he was about to bolt. "I'm worried that if my dad gets upset or judges you because of the age thing you'll . . . back off. Try to pull away from me again."

Kurt was kind of happy to see how offended Blaine looked at that. "I'm not going to pull away, okay?" he said, shaking his head. "God, not after yesterday. Yesterday I accepted your punishment and your control and this morning I accepted this," he let go of Kurt's hand so he could hold up his arm encircled by Kurt's black cuff. "What does this mean?" he said in a teasing voice.

Kurt smiled sheepishly as Blaine parroted his own words back at him. "It means you're mine."

"I'm yours. And being yours is already making me happier than I've ever been. It doesn't matter what your dad says. I mean, it matters, because he's your dad but no matter what he says, I'm not going to run. We're us now. Whatever happens, we handle it together."

Kurt smiled for real this time. Oh, yes, Blaine was so getting the world's most amazing orgasm as soon as they got home. He smiled even wider at the thought of Blaine's apartment as "home." "Okay," he said with a deep breath. "Let's do this." He took Blaine's hand back in his and opened the door before he could change his mind.

There wasn't anyone in the living room, and Kurt could hear muted voices coming from the kitchen as he and Blaine took off their jackets and hung them on the tree in the corner. When the door closed with a bang his dad's voice called out, "Kurt? Is that you? Get in here and tell your stepmother that I'm not going to drop dead if she uses real eggs in the French toast!"

Kurt's heart was racing but he pulled Blaine resolutely toward the bright kitchen.

"I eat rabbit pellets for breakfast every other day of the week, I don't think it's too much to ask for one real meal," Burt was telling his wife. "KUR . . . Oh." He had turned to yell again but was cut off by the sight of Kurt and Blaine standing side-by-side in the doorway. Despite his reassuring words at the door, Kurt could feel Blaine stiffen under his dad's gaze.

When Burt cut off Carole turned too, a loaf of bread in her hand. "Oh. Hello," she said lightly.

Kurt tried to smile. "Dad, Carole, this is Blaine."

His dad's gaze took in their faces, then swept down to where their hands were joined, Blaine's black-cuffed right one in Kurt's left. Kurt pulled Blaine a few steps into the room, giving his dad what he hoped was a "please just let me explain before you spontaneously combust" look.

Carole looked from the boys to Burt then put the loaf of bread she was holding down on the counter and crossed the room, grabbing a tea towel to wipe her hands. "It's very nice to meet you, Blaine," she said, holding out her hand.

Kurt clutched at Blaine; he was suddenly afraid that something terrible would happen if they let go of each other. But Blaine was much too well-mannered to ignore Carole's proffered handshake. "Thank you, Mrs. Hummel," he said as he took it.

"Oh, it's Hudson, honey. I didn't change my name."

Blaine shot Kurt a reproving look, as if he felt Kurt should have informed him of this in advance. But when Carole dropped his hand he clutched blindly back for Kurt's.  
>Burt was still staring silently at their wrists, and clouds were building in his expression that Kurt knew meant trouble. Carole intervened again. "So how do you know Kurt, Blaine?"<p>

Kurt and Blaine began to speak at the same time.

"Well, I . . ."

"Blaine was . . ."

But Burt's voice drowned them both out. "Kurt. Can I see you in the living room?"

Blaine shot Kurt a panicked look but Carole gave him her biggest, most genuine smile. "Go ahead, Kurt. Blaine can help me put the casserole together and then we'll bring you both some coffee."

Kurt smiled gratefully at her and followed his dad, who'd pushed past him to make his way to the front room. They'd barely moved out of earshot when Burt turned on him.

"What the hell are you doing, Kurt?"

Kurt winced at the volume of Burt's voice. "Dad! They'll hear you."

"I don't give a rat's ass who hears me and believe me you've got much bigger things to worry about! Talk."

"Maybe you'd better sit down . . ." Kurt began.

"I am not going to sit down. And I'm getting a little tired of everyone in this family treating me like I've got one foot in the grave! You need to explain yourself right now."

"Okay, I know he's older . . ."

Burt gasped out a kind of bitter laugh. "Yeah, that's the second thing we're going to talk about."

"Second?"

"He's got a black cuff, Kurt. What the hell are you doing messing around with a claimed sub?!"

Kurt was genuinely stunned by that. And when he got over stunned he felt even more hurt. It hadn't even occurred to his dad that maybe the cuff was his? "Do you seriously think I would do something like that? It's my cuff, Dad. I claimed him. He's my soulmate."

Burt sat down.

He stared up at Kurt with such an expression of astonishment that Kurt's hurt was now giving way to anger. "Come on, Dad. I thought you were the one person who actually believed that I'm a dom."

Burt's expression cleared and he pointed a finger at his son. "Hey. Don't do that. You know that's not what this is about."

"I can see it on your face. You can't believe I actually claimed a sub."

"Are you kidding me?" Burt's voice rose and Kurt tried to shush him again. The last thing he needed was for Blaine to hear any of this. "You think I don't want you to be happy? But I'm not gonna lie to you, Kurt. And I'm not gonna pretend to be thrilled that your soulmate is . . . how old is he anyway?"

"_Blaine_ is twenty-seven."

Burt sighed and rubbed a hand across his forehead. "And how did you meet _Blaine_?"

This was even harder to admit. "He's substituting for my history teacher."

Burt pinned Kurt with a significant look. "The one who got fired for fooling around with that Karofsky kid?"

Really, he'd been stupid to think that he'd be able to make his dad understand. And if he couldn't expect his own family to be on their side then what could they expect from the rest of the world? Kurt shook his head and started to pace toward the kitchen. "Okay, this was a mistake. I thought that you of all people would be able to put your prejudice aside and just be happy for me. But I guess I was wrong. So Blaine and I are just going to . . ."

"Kurt!" Burt's voice stopped Kurt in his tracks and he turned back to his dad. "Put your butt on that sofa and quit putting words in my mouth." He watched silently while Kurt considered, then went to sit on the end of the sofa. When he spoke again his voice was back to a normal volume.

"Look, you got dealt a crappy hand, Kurt. You lost your mom, you had to deal with being gay in that cesspool of a school, and when you got marked as a dom I thought you finally caught a break." Burt leaned forward to emphasize his words. "I was so happy for you. Not that there's anything wrong with being a sub, but I know you Kurt. You were born a dom. And I was so relieved that fate or the universe or whatever saw you for who you are and not the box people try to put you in." He took a slow breath. "But this, Kurt? You know what people are gonna think. What they're gonna say. It feels to me like you're going from the frying pan to the fire and sue me; I just want being with your soulmate to be a joy for you."

Kurt scooted forward himself. He wanted so much to make his father understand. "But it is a joy, Dad. Blaine is amazing. If you look, you'll see that."

"And how does he feel about this? Submitting to you?"

Much as he wanted to paint a perfect picture, Kurt had promised himself he'd be honest with his dad. "He was freaked out at first," he admitted. "Obviously, the age thing and I don't think he thought I'd be able to dominate him. But last night I . . . well, we had kind of a breakthrough. Last night."

"So the whole Rachel thing was a lie, then."

Kurt bit his lip. "I didn't want to lie to you. But things got really – intense – and I couldn't leave him. I was being responsible," he insisted.

Burt shook his head. "To your sub, maybe, but what about your family?"

Kurt shrugged a little. "My sub comes first now."

"You could have told us the truth."

"Come on, Dad. What would you have said if I told you I was spending the night with a guy you'd never met, soulmate or not? I needed to be taking care of Blaine, not arguing with you."

Kurt could see his dad struggling with all of this. He could tell the dom in Burt wanted to be proud of his son for doing what had to be done, but the dad in him wanted to berate him for being irresponsible. He sat up straight and tried his best to look like a dom doing what was best for his sub instead of a teenager in trouble for breaking curfew.

Burt eyed him for a minute and then went straight for the big guns. "And what about sex? He's got to be more – experienced – than you."

Meeting his dad dom to dom was hard when he started blushing. "Of course he is, but we worked all that out."

"How, exactly, did you work it out?" Burt asked.

"Oh my God, Dad, I'm not giving you details. I'm the dom. I decide what we do."

"And he doesn't pressure you?"

Kurt dropped his head in his hands and couldn't hold back a noise of frustration.

"Okay," Burt said, "I get it. You're the dom."

When Kurt looked up again, his dad didn't look angry or frustrated any more. He looked sad. "God Kurt, you're sixteen. Are you sure you're ready for this?"

Kurt shrugged again. "It doesn't matter if I'm ready or not. I've got it. But everyone keeps telling me you meet your soulmate when the time is right, so I must be more ready than we think."

Burt just shook his head and sighed. "Well, I'm sure as hell not ready."

"Is it safe to come in?" Carole poked her head out the kitchen door, looking like she was trying to assess the damage. Burt waved her forward.

"Come on. I might as well get to know my son's new highest priority."

Carole entered, carrying the good silver sugar bowl and creamer and followed by Blaine, bearing a tray with four cups of steaming coffee. He looked much more relaxed, and Kurt smiled gratefully at Carole. He held out his hand to Blaine who set the tray on the coffee table and settled next to him on the sofa. They exchanged a look, both evaluating the other for wounds, and Blaine must have found Kurt as undamaged as Kurt found him because he smiled and squeezed Kurt's hand.

"Blaine is very handy in the kitchen," Carole said as she settled herself on the other armchair. "You'd better watch your back, Kurt. He might give you a run for your money."

Burt and Blaine snorted simultaneously and Kurt felt like he'd never loved Carole more than at that moment. There was silence while everyone fixed their coffee, then Burt and Blaine both spoke at once.

"Mr. Hummel, I . . ."

"So Blaine . . ."

Blaine sat back and lowered his eyes. Kurt knew he was doing it in deference to his dad, but he found he didn't much like Blaine showing submission to someone else, even his father.

"So Kurt tells me you've had some trouble submitting to him."

"Dad!" Kurt all but yelled. He was a dom in a soulmate claim but still his dad could mortify him with a sentence.

"That's true, Sir." Blaine didn't seem fazed at all. "I'm sure you can imagine how difficult it was for me to find out my soulmate was a student. I underestimated him pretty severely." Blaine blushed a little, and Kurt did too remembering how he'd punished Blaine that morning for that underestimation. Burt's sharp gaze moved back and forth between them because, of course his dad would never miss something like that.

"And now?" he asked.

"Now I know that fate was right. I need him. I can't be without him. And I get that this is kind of . . . different and whatever rules you want to make I'll obey, of course. I just need him."

Kurt disliked hearing Blaine promise to obey his dad even more than he'd disliked the show of submission.

"Okay," Burt nodded, "well the first thing is – I'm gonna need to see your mark."

Blaine nodded and began to unfasten the silver buckle.

"No," Kurt said sharply.

Blaine turned a confused look on Kurt. He held his arm out tentatively, obviously assuming that Kurt meant he'd undo the cuff. Kurt ignored it. "He's not showing you his mark," he told his dad calmly.

"Kurt, he's twenty-seven and your teacher. You're asking me to take an awful lot on faith here."

"It's okay, Kurt. I really don't . . ."

"I said no," Kurt told Blaine and immediately Blaine's hands fell back into his lap and he lowered his eyes to look at them. Kurt hoped that while he was noticing things his dad wouldn't miss Blaine's perfect and immediate submission.

"It's not a big deal, Kurt," Burt reasoned. "If someone had needed to see my mark to prove – my claim or whatever, I'd have been happy to do it."

"That's different, Dad."

"How is it different?"

Kurt couldn't believe they were back to this. "God, do I have to rent a billboard?! You're a dom. I'm the dom here, Dad. You could have shown your mark to a thousand people it still wouldn't be the same. How many people would you have let Mom show her mark to?"

Burt didn't seem to have an answer for this, he just stared at his son. Carole reached over and rubbed his arm gently.

"If people at school find out, God knows who I'll have to let see Blaine's mark. Principal Figgins, probably, and maybe people from the School Board or something. I'm not going to make him show it to my own father. I've seen it. You have to trust me. If you need to see a mark I'll show you mine."

They all sat in silence then, Kurt and Burt kind of staring each other down, and Kurt had the feeling Burt was evaluating this new person he was seeing in his son. Then he felt Blaine's fingers touch his knee and he turned to look at his sub. Blaine's eyes flickered down to his hand on Kurt's knee and back again and Kurt realized with a flush of pride that Blaine was asking permission to speak. He was making a show of his submission for Burt's sake. Kurt had to hold back a smug grin as he said "Go ahead."

Blaine turned to Burt. "Mr. Hummel, when I first realized that Kurt was the Kurt Hummel on my wrist, I was just as upset as I'm sure you are. I completely freaked out. The first time we talked, to be honest, I was the one acting like a teenager and Kurt – it was like he'd been doing it forever. He had me on my knees inside five minutes."

Kurt stared at Blaine. Was that how it had happened? Because all he remembered was feeling completely helpless. Then really angry. And then the kissing.

"I've only known him four days but I can already see that Kurt is the most kind, compassionate, caring person . . ."

"I know that," Burt interrupted.

"But if you push him too hard he can come down like the hand of God."

Burt couldn't help chuckling at that. "Yep, I know that, too."

"Sir, if Kurt allowed it I'd happily show you my mark. And I was the one who asked if we could keep our relationship secret at school, but if he really wanted me to I'd come out to everyone. I'd be scared, but I'd do it." He held up his right arm and pushed his sleeve back so that the entirety of the black cuff was visible. "When I accepted this, I accepted that he's in charge. I trust him to decide what's best for us. And, even if I wanted to try to control him, I couldn't. You raised quite a dominant, you know."

"Well, we agree on that." Kurt could see that his father was reevaluating Blaine. He thought he could see some cracks in Burt's mask of disapproval.

A chime sounded from the kitchen and Carole jumped up immediately. "That'll be the French toast, so I suggest we take this to the kitchen and take some time to actually get to know Blaine before we make too many judgments." She gave Burt a pointed look and squeezed his shoulder as she made her way out of the room with complete confidence that the men would all follow her.

"And she's supposed to be the sub," Burt harrumphed.

Kurt couldn't help smiling. Yep, the cracks were definitely showing. He stood up at the same time as his dad and tugged Blaine upright too. "Come on. I told you you don't want to miss Carole's French toast casserole."

And true to her word, as they ate Carole quizzed Blaine about his family and ambitions, pointing out interesting items for Burt's notice. She exclaimed over his academic achievements and tut-tutted about his many years of waiting to meet Kurt, bounced with excitement at learning who Blaine's brother was and almost fainted when he promised to bring him over the next time Cooper came home for a visit. And somewhere between all that she managed to negotiate a treaty that would allow Kurt to spend his weekend nights with Blaine, as long as they promised they'd both come for Friday family dinners and that Kurt would be home by nine o'clock on Sunday.

The family dinners were actually the biggest sticking point, because Finn would be there and if there was anyone less capable of keeping a secret than Finn, Kurt had yet to meet them. He was pretty sure even Brittany could be trusted further than his stepbrother. But Carole promised to put the fear of God into him if he mentioned a word, even to Rachel, and Kurt figured that at the very least maybe he could get some good blackmail material from Finn's computer to keep him in line.

Blaine was the epitome of deferent sub throughout the meal, answering every question put to him, offering platters and bowls and pitchers to Kurt, never interrupting and always shutting up the minute anyone talked over him. As grateful as Kurt was for it, he thought that Blaine had better get over it if it was going to become part of the Hudson/Hummel household.

Things went so well that Blaine felt comfortable enough to stay with Burt and Carole while Kurt went up to his room to change out of yesterday's clothes. When he came back down Burt was waiting by the door and he could hear Carole in the kitchen giving Blaine instructions for reheating the leftover casserole she was packing up.

"I should probably be worried about those two getting so close, shouldn't I?" he said with a rueful smile. "Now between the two of you I'm never going to hear the end of how great he is."

Kurt smiled back and turned to grab their jackets from the coat tree. When he turned back his dad's face was serious again.

"I can see it, you know," Burt said.

"What?"

"You've changed. You're not the same kid you were at dinner Friday night. In two days you grew up on me."

"I kind of had to," Kurt said.

"I know. I just . . ." Burt struggled for the right words. "Look, I know I'm not gay, but I am a dom, and if you ever need any help or have any trouble . . . well, I want you to know you can come to me. And I promise not to make any cracks about I told you so or whatever. I just want you to be happy, Kurt."

"I am happy Dad," Kurt said, pulling Burt into a hug, "And thank you."

Burt wrapped his arms around his son, and if he held on longer than was strictly necessary, well, Kurt wasn't going to complain about it.

Blaine and Carole came back then, smiling and chatting like old friends, and Kurt was sure Blaine's eyes darkened in appreciation when he took in the form-fitting black turtleneck Kurt had chosen for the day. Yeah, they definitely needed to get home fast. They rushed through goodbyes and it was nice to meet yous (although Kurt took the time to enjoy the sight of his father shaking hands with his sub) and both of them breathed a sigh of relief when the front door closed behind them.

"We lived," Blaine said.

"We lived," Kurt repeated.

Kurt was so full of relief and happiness that he wanted to just push Blaine up against the car and kiss the crap out of him, but the passenger side was facing the house and he was sure his dad would be watching so he settled for a surreptitious caress of Blaine's ass as he bent to secure Carole's Tupperware container on the floor in front of his seat. Blaine picked up his mood right away and settled into his seat with a wiggle of his eyebrows.

"So was I good?" he asked pointedly.

"You were so good. You were a very, very good boy today." Kurt could see the desire flare in Blaine's eyes. He practically ran around to the driver's side and climbed in, with a little wave in the direction of the house. He was sure he saw a curtain flutter in response.

When they got into the apartment Blaine only lasted long enough to get the leftover casserole in the refrigerator before falling to his knees with such force that Kurt could hear the smack when they hit the floor. He turned from stripping off his jacket to find Blaine looking up at him with an expression that was already a little unfocused.

"You know I don't expect you to kneel every time we walk through the door, right?" he said.

Blaine smiled and said in a quiet, soft voice, "Well, to be fair, yesterday I thought I was going to lose you and today you're going to let me come after two days of teasing me. I'm sure on a normal day I'll manage to resist the urge." When Kurt didn't answer, he held up his cuffed arm.

Kurt shook his head. "No way. I've been waiting all day to see you naked in that." He remembered what Finn had said about orders. "I'm coming into the bedroom in two minutes and I expect to find you naked on your knees. And no clothes thrown around – put them where they belong."

"Yes, Sir."

Blaine wasn't teasing him – Kurt could see he was already too far gone for that. The "Sir" had just come out and Kurt couldn't deny that it sent a shiver through his body. "Go," he commanded.

Blaine went.

With one eye on the clock above the piano Kurt went to the kitchen, found a glass and poured some water. He sipped it slowly for what seemed like the longest two minutes of his life, then set it on the counter and made his way to the bedroom. The sight that greeted him took his breath away.

It was just Blaine, of course, but really there was no such thing as "just" Blaine. Because Blaine was everything. And naked Blaine – kneeling on the floor in that submissive pose, sculpted body exposed and quivering ever so slightly, cock upright and twitching gently, right wrist encased in Kurt's black leather – was like everything cubed.

He wanted to tell Blaine all that he was feeling. How he couldn't believe that this was his life. How he'd never in a million years imagined that he would ever share his life with anyone so overwhelmingly beautiful, outside and in. How the sight of Blaine kneeling and naked and yearning for him, wearing nothing but the symbol of Kurt's ownership, made him feel like he'd won the lottery, a Tony award, and free access to the Marc Jacob sample room all at the same time. How he was hard as a rock in his jeans and they hadn't even touched each other yet.

But when he opened his mouth all that came out was "Oh my God."

Blaine looked up, smiled, and held out his arm. "Now?" he asked.

"Now," Kurt repeated. He unbuckled the black cuff and removed it, setting it on the night stand before offering his own wrist to Blaine. After he opened it, Blaine let his thumb caress gently over his name on Kurt's wrist before handing the cuff to Kurt to place next to his by the bed.

But then it was awkward. The thought of just stripping off his own clothes while Blaine watched felt like too much. But he couldn't exactly do this in jeans and a turtleneck, and he was too hard to stay in pants much longer. He could tell Blaine to undress him, but this was supposed to be a reward for Blaine. He didn't want to make him work for it.

So Kurt fell back on his tried and true anti-awkwardness strategy. He knelt in front of Blaine, threaded his fingers through the dark curls behind his ear, pulled him close and kissed him hard and deep. Blaine submitted to the kiss, mouth open, tongue passive, hands still on his thighs. But a tiny whimper escaped from the back of his throat and his cock jumped so forcefully that Kurt felt it bump against his own belly.

"Get up on the bed," he said as he pulled away from Blaine's chasing lips. Blaine obeyed immediately, and on his way around to the other side Kurt stripped off his sweater and undershirt and deposited them on the dresser. He climbed onto the bed and kissed Blaine again and this time Blaine couldn't seem to stop himself from trailing his hands up and down Kurt's chest, fingers catching on Kurt's nipples and making him gasp.

"Lie down," Kurt whispered against Blaine's lips.

They settled on their sides, still connected at the mouth, and Blaine immediately curled his body around Kurt's like a drowning man clinging to a buoy. He threw one leg over Kurt's hips and his hand slid along Kurt's backbone as they continued to fall deeper into the soft, gentle heat of each other's mouths.

And with Blaine in his arms, pumping his long-denied cock against the rough fabric or Kurt's jeans, he couldn't help wondering what would happen if he told Blaine he'd changed his mind. That he was going to make him wait one more day. He wouldn't, of course, not now, but the mental picture of Blaine struggling to control his disappointment and desperation in perfect submission was enough to make Kurt grind back against Blaine even harder.

Blaine's lips broke from Kurt's and he threw his head back under the intensity of the press of harsh denim against his over-sensitive erection. "Kurt . . ." he gasped.

Kurt took advantage of the position to mouth down Blaine's neck, sucking at the point of his Adam's apple then further down to kiss the hollow at the base of Blaine's throat.

"Kurt . . . please . . ." Blaine begged, and his fingers slid to the front of Kurt's body to tug at the waistband of his pants. "I want to feel you . . ."

"Okay."

Blaine had Kurt's pants open in record time, moving to pull them down while Kurt wriggled his way out. Underwear followed and as soon as it cleared Kurt's feet and fell forgotten to the floor with his jeans Blaine was back at his side, body curling tightly around his again and this time when he pressed in his cock met Kurt's and even dry they thrust together in perfect, perfect rhythm. They were kissing again, and between the intimate slide of their tongues, the press of their hips, Blaine's fingers gripping his ass to pull him closer, and Blaine's breathy, needy moans against his lips, Kurt wanted to abandon all his plans and just grind mindlessly until they both came like this, wrapped around each other in a gasping, quivering heap.

But he had plans, damn it. He'd made a promise. He pulled his mouth away from Blaine's (and it took superhuman effort to resist Blaine's sharp cry of protest) and pressed a firm hand to Blaine's chest. "Wait. Stop."

Blaine froze, chest heaving and body trembling. "What's wrong," he asked.

Kurt smiled. "Nothing's wrong, silly. But I promised you something and I don't want this to end before I can deliver."

Blaine's eyes widened and a deep shudder shook his frame. With a little push from Kurt's hand he fell onto his back on the mattress.

Kurt spread Blaine's legs and knelt between them. Blaine's golden eyes had gone almost completely black and he looked at Kurt like he was an angel sent to take Blaine to paradise.

"Are you sure you can handle this?" Kurt asked. "I mean, you can come, but not in my mouth. I'm really not ready for that."

Blaine nodded. "I'll tell you if I'm too close, I promise."

Kurt took a breath and just stared at Blaine's cock. He had no idea what he was doing, but he knew what Blaine had done to him had felt good, so he wet his lips and bent forward, pressing them to the base of Blaine's shaft and dragging them, just his moist lips, up along Blaine's length and over the head, then back down again. Blaine sucked in a ragged breath and exhaled a long moan.

"Fuck, Kurt. Oh my God . . ."

On the second trip Kurt pushed his tongue out to join his lips sliding up and over and back down again. The taste was amazing, he'd never really been able to imagine how someone's cock could taste any different from their elbow or their chin or any other part of their body, but the warmth and strength and softness made his head spin. He kept the licking rhythm going for a while, enjoying Blaine's moaning and cursing and the way his hips bucked gently upward despite his best efforts to control them.

Finally, Kurt raised his head to look at Blaine, whose eyes were closed now, head thrown back on the pillow, mouth slightly open. Kurt had heard people talk about the throes of ecstasy and he was pretty sure that was it. Blaine looked so completely vulnerable and the need to take care of him and fulfill him was so strong Kurt thought he could taste it right alongside the taste of Blaine's flesh.

"You have to keep your butt on the bed now," he said. Blaine could only nod frantically.

Kurt lowered his head again and this time let his mouth slide around the head of Blaine's cock and slowly down the shaft, gripping it with his lips as he went, and he could have sworn he felt it get harder, like it was pushing back against the pressure of Kurt's lips. He couldn't take it very far – he'd have to work on that – but Blaine didn't seem to mind if the noises he was making were anything to go by. Kurt sucked gently and slid his mouth up and down.

"Oh fuck, Kurt . . . I'm close . . . I need to come . . ."

Kurt pulled his mouth up and off and Blaine thrust violently into the air but he didn't come and for this one time Kurt didn't want to do anything to help him over. He stroked Blaine's thigh gently and when his ass finally settled back on the bed he asked, "Can you take it one more time? Because I really want to do that some more."

"I . . . I think so," Blaine stammered.

So Kurt went back to work, taking Blaine's cock back in his mouth, sucking, dragging, and letting his tongue dance around the head and under the ridge until Blaine was crying out sharply on each exhale, his body rigid with the force of his need.

"Please let me come . . . please God . . . I can't . . . fuck . . ."

Kurt finally took pity on him, slipping off his cock and moving up the bed to pull Blaine back onto his side, wrapped around him in their original position. Blaine was still wet from Kurt's mouth and the moisture was just enough to make the friction perfect. He began to rock against Kurt immediately and Kurt pushed back, whispering in Blaine's ear, "Come for me now, whenever you can," before capturing Blaine's lips again in another demanding kiss.

Blaine's hands grappled again at his ass, fingers slipping into the crack and Kurt could feel his own orgasm building, tensing his balls, even as Blaine began to chant, "So close . . . so close Kurt . . ." He wrapped his arms tighter around his sub, pushing into him as frantically as Blaine was pushing back, legs and cocks and tongues tangled up in each other and straining for release.

And then Blaine went perfectly still against Kurt's thrusting body, for just a moment all his muscles relaxed and a sigh of "Kurt . . ." slipped past his lips. Then with a sharp cry he tensed, curling tight against Kurt's body again and Kurt could feel him coming, shuddering, panting, crying out his pleasure, hands tightening on Kurt's ass and it was that, Blaine's desperate grip on his ass pulling Kurt even harder against his spasming cock, and the warm splash of semen against his overheated flesh, that finally sent Kurt over the edge as well and then they both were crying out, coming violently in each other's arms.

When Kurt came back to his senses Blaine was still trembling through aftershocks of pleasure. He stroked down Blaine's spine, trying to soothe him, planting little kisses on his lips until finally Blaine opened his eyes to look at Kurt and, God. If that look wasn't love Kurt was very, very mistaken about what love would look like.

"Was that good?" Kurt asked gently.

"You have no idea." Blaine nestled his head on Kurt's chest, still gasping, settling in with that weighty press that Kurt was coming to associate with perfect contentment.

"Thank you . . . God." Blaine whispered against his chest. "I waited . . . so long."

Kurt chuckled. "I hate to burst your bubble, but I don't really think two days is all that long."

He felt Blaine's head shake against his skin. "Not to come," Blaine panted. "For you. Waited so long for you."

They were dirty and sweaty and sticky with come that was almost certainly making its way down onto the bedding. Kurt couldn't have cared less. At that moment, there was no mess in the universe that could have made him let go of Blaine.


	13. Chapter Thirteen

It was almost okay for Blaine, waking up Monday morning with what he already thought of as Kurt's side of the bed cold and empty. Okay because he was still floating in a happy haze from the day they'd spent together. A day for which the brunch and the long-awaited orgasm that had seemed so intense that he thought he might pass out – gripped impossibly tight in Kurt's arms, his hot release mixing with Blaine's across their entwined bodies – had been just the beginning.

They'd dozed for a bit, then showered (separately, because Kurt wasn't quite ready for co-showering and Blaine had to admit that he, too, was grateful for a little privacy to bask in his feelings), then he'd managed to persuade Kurt that they'd be much more comfortable back in pajama bottoms. So they'd been lounging on the couch drinking hot tea that Blaine made for them when Kurt asked him to play something on the piano.

At first he'd been at a loss for what to choose. He considered some showy pieces, or something he could sing along to, but finally selected the simple love theme from an old French movie that was one of his favorite songs to play, and seemed to perfectly fit the mood of lounging with your lover on a Sunday afternoon. Kurt had sat on the floor next to the piano, leaning against the wall so he could watch Blaine as he played, but eventually closing his eyes to let the hypnotic music wrap around him. Blaine played the song three times through without pausing just so he could keep watching Kurt swaying gently, the pale skin of his chest contrasting with the black pajama pants, losing himself in the sound Blaine created. The piano was an extension of himself and watching Kurt respond to the music that Blaine was making was like watching him respond to Blaine's own hands on his body. It was a new kind of gift to give the boy who was becoming his everything.

Then he'd asked Kurt to sing for him and had happily played the opening bars of "Don't Cry for Me, Argentina," but after only a few measures his hands had slipped from the keys and Kurt was forced to continue a cappella because Blaine had completely forgotten how to play the song. He'd never in his life heard a voice like Kurt's. The high, clear purity of it seemed like the perfect embodiment of Kurt himself. If he hadn't already been falling in love with Kurt, that voice would definitely have pushed him over the edge.

Eventually they'd ordered a pizza and settled on the couch to laugh at reality TV and, as Kurt tartly remarked, absorb a week's supply of cheese and processed meat. At some point eating pizza had turned into cheesy, spicy kisses and Blaine had found himself with a lapful of hard-again Kurt (another reason to be grateful his soulmate was sixteen) grinding gently down onto him while Blaine's hands slipped under the pants and Kurt's briefs to caress his ass and encourage him on.  
>So Kurt had been forced to go home commando, his underwear once again agitating with Blaine's in the washing machine.<p>

They'd talked on the phone for almost two hours that night, topics ranging from why Rachel Berry was somehow simultaneously the world's best and most infuriating best friend to how Blaine's parents always managed to make him feel inferior to his older brother even though he knew they approved of his life choices more than Cooper's. Eventually their conversation turned to teasing innuendo and Blaine could have sworn by the tone of Kurt's voice that he was touching himself while they talked. And although Kurt's recovery time was starting to worry him (seriously – again? He'd already come three times that day) the realization that he himself was no longer free to do the same soon had Blaine hard as well.

When he'd drifted off to sleep his hard-on was not at all desperate, just a sort of gentle, comforting reminder of his submission to Kurt. And when his alarm woke him Monday morning he was still basking in the afterglow of Kurt. The glow started to wear off, though, after Blaine showered and buckled the black cuff back on over his mark.

Deciding what to wear was a challenge. Long sleeves that would help him avoid too much attention to his new status might also make Kurt think he was trying to hide it. But short sleeves left him feeling like he was wearing a neon sign flashing "Claimed! Claimed! Claimed!" He settled on a dark purple short-sleeved polo under a silver-gray cardigan with tight sleeves that he could push up to three-quarter length. But as he surveyed himself in the mirror over his dresser it all felt like the wrong kind of compromise. Keeping the secret had been his idea – so why did it rub him the wrong way all of the sudden?

When he arrived early at McKinley Kurt was waiting for him at his office door just as he'd been on Friday morning, but this time there was no coffee and no self-conscious pose against the wall. Instead he was fidgeting with his bag and almost bouncing as if he was overflowing with energy that he didn't know what to do with. And then there were the pants. Today's pants were leather. Black, painted-on leather.

"Are you trying to kill me?" Blaine asked, trying and failing to not stare at Kurt's crotch as he fumbled for his office key.

Kurt double-checked the currently deserted hallway. "I guess I woke up feeling a little – aggressive, this morning," he said, touching Blaine's black cuff by way of explanation.

Right. Because everyone would see that Blaine was claimed but no one would know it was Kurt who'd claimed him. He was grateful for the decision to not cover the cuff because Kurt was impatiently caressing his arm above and around it as he worked the lock. As soon as the door opened he slipped his fingers under the leather and tugged Blaine inside the door by it.

"Wait . . . keys . . . ." Blaine reached back around the door to pull the key back out of the lock. He had barely closed the door when Kurt slammed into him from behind, pushing him face-first into the door with a thump, and latched onto the skin behind Blaine's ear with lips and teeth and hot breath. Kurt was marking him, Blaine realized, and he turned his head to give Kurt better access and moaned softly as Kurt captured his hands from behind and held them crossed at the small of his back, still sucking fiercely at the spot on the back of his neck.

With the sharp pain of the biting suction came the realization that he needed this as much as Kurt did. Blaine wanted to keep the secret, he needed to, really, but the sub in him definitely didn't like denying what Kurt was to him. Kurt's punishing assault on his neck felt completely right. "God, yes," he whispered. "Thank you . . ."

Kurt actually growled and sucked harder, working at Blaine's neck until the combination of the hot, sharp sensation on his skin, his tightly restrained hands, and the press of his groin against the hard door made him whine, high and needy. Then in a sharp move Kurt let go of his neck, and backed up enough to flip Blaine around, pulling his hands forward and up to pin against the door over his head. He had a look of such intense possession on his face that Blaine found he could barely breathe in the face of it. He was torn between feeling guilty that it was his cowardice that was causing Kurt to have all these feelings, and just desperately wanting Kurt to channel all of that frustration into his body: kissing, touching, taking, even hurting, if that's what Kurt needed to do. Almost none of which was going to happen in this tiny office right before school started.

"I'm yours," he said, trying to reassure Kurt as much as mere words could. "I'm yours no matter who knows or doesn't know. Just because it's a secret doesn't make it any less real."

Kurt's hands loosened on his and he stared deeply into Blaine's eyes, looking for what, Blaine wasn't sure. Reassurance? Honesty? Blaine brought one hand down to stroke his fingers over Kurt's cheekbone and down the back of his neck, nudging him closer until finally their lips met and Blaine was ready for an onslaught but the kiss was gentle and sweet and left him longing for more as Kurt pulled away. And for some reason that was what finally made Kurt smile.

"I'm sorry," he said. "I just didn't expect how much this would get inside my head."

Blaine shook his head and let the fingers on Kurt's neck trail down his arm to clasp his hand. "No, I'm sorry. I know it feels like I want to keep this secret because I'm ashamed of you and that's not it, I swear, Kurt." The fact that Kurt wouldn't quite meet his eyes told Blaine that he was right. "But this is my job. If I lose those kids' respect then I have no authority and I can't do my job. I like teaching and I think I'm good at it . . ."

"You are, of course you are . . ." Kurt finally looked at him again.

"And I just don't want to mess with a good thing, okay? I know I should be stronger and braver for you, I'm sorry . . ."

"No." Kurt squeezed Blaine's hand and shook his head. "I understand. I really do. I just don't think my dom hormones understand as much as my brain does." He smiled the insecure, lopsided smile that Blaine hadn't seen for a while. "You're amazing Blaine, and I'd deal with worse than this if I had to, to be with you."

Blaine stretched up to bump Kurt's nose with his own. "Well feel free to take your dominance out on my neck any time you need to. Or any other part of me."

"Oh, God!" Kurt dropped Blaine's hand and turned his head to the side to inspect the mark he'd left behind Blaine's ear.

"How's it look?" Blaine asked.

"Actually, I think it's pretty impressive work for a teen virgin."

Blaine smiled, relieved that Kurt seemed to be getting his equilibrium back. "Okay, you know you're not a virgin any more, right?" he teased.

Kurt pulled back a little bit and his eyebrows came together in a frown. "Well, we haven't had sex."

Blaine's own eyebrows shot up in surprise. "None of what we did this weekend felt like sex to you?" he asked.

"You know what I mean."

Blaine tried to suppress his grin because the last thing he needed was for Kurt to think he was laughing at him. "Okay," he said, "for straight people I guess there's one thing they can do that they call sex and maybe nothing else counts. But that's not us. We can do all kinds of things and plenty of guys never have – intercourse – at all." He couldn't resist letting his free hand stroke down Kurt's back and over his ass in those impossible pants. "I don't know about you, but I had amazing sex this weekend." He tugged Kurt closer so their lips were almost touching. "And I'm pretty sure that was you coming down my throat, so I'm going to say you did too. You're still my teenaged dom," he moved his mouth around to whisper in Kurt's ear, "but you're totally not a virgin anymore."

Kurt looked surprised for about a half a second, then he suddenly burst into laughter and collapsed into the little chair opposite the desk and hiding his hands in his face.

"Ooo-kay," Blaine said hesitantly. "Is this another dom hormone thing that I should be worried about? You're not hysterical, are you?"

Kurt looked up at him, still laughing, and the hand pressed to his mouth came away long enough for him to gasp out, "I'm not a virgin anymore."

Blaine was still baffled. "Right."

"And my dad said . . . that I . . . looked different . . ." Each word seemed funnier than the last to Kurt and tears were starting to fill his eyes. "And he thought . . . it was just because I was growing up . . . but I wasn't . . . a virgin . . ."

Blaine didn't try to figure it out. He just tried to be glad that Kurt was laughing now instead of burning up from the inside out with dominant intensity. He had a feeling it was going to turn out to be an interesting day.

The lightening of Kurt's mood that laughing over his dad's inadvertent clichéd comment had brought didn't even last halfway through first period. He had dragged all of his books with him that morning from class to class, determined to avoid his locker and Rachel. He wasn't at all sure, with the mood he was in, that he wouldn't blurt the whole thing out the minute he laid eyes on her. He hadn't anticipated the kind of feelings he'd woken up to that morning. They'd agreed not to go public and up until this morning all Kurt had felt about that was a kind of sad regret that Blaine didn't feel ready to acknowledge him. But he understood. It was logical, for someone in Blaine's position, not to want to risk the problems that being with a student, even as soulmates, could cause for him. But this morning he'd woken up with some kind of dominant monster trying to claw its way out of his chest. It had absolutely roared "MINE" in his head when he'd seen Blaine in the pushed-up sleeves that proudly displayed his new status for all to see (and thank God for those sleeves because if it had looked like Blaine was trying to hide the cuff he might not have sleeves any more).

Even after all this weekend had brought, he'd never really felt anything as intense as when he'd had Blaine up against the door. The need to mark had been overwhelming and completely instinctual. He wasn't sure he liked that: feeling completely taken over by urges that he didn't fully consciously understand. And even now it all prickled in the back of his brain – the feeling that something was wrong, off, the universe was tilted and really needed to be shoved back in to alignment.

So he avoided all of his friends, Rachel most carefully because she already knew something was up, and fumbled through his classes with the only thought in his head that each new class period more students were noticing Blaine's cuff, pointing it out and maybe asking Blaine questions about his new status. The teachers would have already noticed, in the break room, and Kurt could imagine the handshakes and pats on the back and friendly inquiries that Blaine would have to make up lies to answer.

Halfway through geometry he found himself rocking agitatedly back and forth and had to force his body back under control. He had to find a way to get past this. The idea of going public terrified Blaine and Kurt understood, he _did_, and he'd promised Blaine this one thing and Blaine had come so very far in just two days towards trusting and completely accepting Kurt and there was no way he was going to let stupid dom hormones screw it up. He was Kurt Hummel. He'd managed to control his sub all weekend. He could certainly control himself.

As long as he didn't have to talk to Rachel.

So he lingered over his clean up in home ec (and actually considered skipping history altogether, if it wasn't for that stupid test) and walked slowly enough that he arrived at the classroom just as the bell was ringing. Rachel was already in her seat and Blaine was there as well, arranging the pile of test papers. Kurt had to stop and clutch the doorjamb at the sight of the black cuff, so open and obvious on his bare arm, and the glimpse he could get from this position of the angry red mark on Blaine's neck.

"Well somebody had a big weekend, I see," said a voice in his ear.

He turned, startled, and found Puck behind him grinning lasciviously. "What are you talking about?" he asked defensively, trying to keep his voice from shaking.

Puck nodded in Blaine's direction and said in a voice that was just loud enough to hear in the classroom, "Black cuff. Somebody got cl-aaaaimed."

Blaine looked up at that and his face went a tiny bit red and Kurt could feel his fingernails digging into the fake wood of the doorjamb. Crap. He could do this. He took a deep breath. He was not going to allow his hormones to ruin his life.

Blaine, to his credit, sounded completely normal when he said, "Noah, Kurt, would you like to join us?"

Kurt took a deep breath and followed Puck into the room. Rachel was staring daggers at him, but Blaine had already started handing out tests, face down on everyone's desks, so she thankfully had no chance to attack. The most she could manage was to whisper under her breath, "What's going on? I've been looking for you all morning."

"Lunch, I promise," Kurt whispered back.

Jenn Gibbs seemed to be absent, so there was no buffer between Kurt and Puck, who didn't have Rachel's sense of propriety where classroom behavior was concerned. When Blaine passed by his desk with the test paper, Puck couldn't resist commenting again. "Way to go, Mr. A."

Blaine didn't respond, just kept moving along the row, and Kurt reached over to smack Puck's arm with the back of his hand. "Hey. Leave him alone."

"Ouch! What?" Puck rubbed his arm.

"It's none of your business."

"Please! If it was Mr. Schue and Miss Pillsbury you'd be all over it. You'd have half of Glee Club singing about how romantic it was."

As Blaine finished with the papers and walked back to his desk, Kurt found himself nibbling on his thumbnail, which was definitely not a good sign. He only ever did that when he was feeling especially out of control.

"I'm sorry!" Puck said, completely out loud now, "I just think when someone meets their soulmate and gets claimed and all it's at least worth a fist bump."

"You think passing gas is worth a fist bump," Rachel said. Kurt gave her a grateful look, but she was staring at him with narrowed eyes like she was trying to figure out what was going on.

Blaine finally decided to take control. "Yes, Noah, thank you. I obviously did meet my soulmate recently and . . ." he held up his arm to indicate his cuff. "And that's really all there is to it. No big deal."

"Was it completely romantic?" One of the girls in the back of the room asked. "Is she really your perfect match?"

Kurt spun around to glare at whoever had spoken and practically bit through his cheek with the effort to control himself.

"Yes, it was romantic and yes, _he_ is completely perfect." Kurt could hear a placating tone in Blaine's voice that seemed to be for him alone.

"He definitely gives a perfect hickey," Puck hissed under his breath at Kurt.

"Oh, God, Noah, shut up!" Kurt said, not at all under his breath. "Not everybody wants to hear what goes on in your filthy brain, okay?!"

Rachel put a hand on Kurt's arm and he turned on her, adrenaline was taking over and he was ready to fight anyone, even his best friend. But the shock on her face brought him back to his senses enough to settle down in his seat. Enough to watch as her eyes moved between angry Kurt and the teacher who was carefully not looking at him and her look of shock changed to one of slowly dawning comprehension.

Crap. Rachel knew.

He expected her to scream with excitement or hug him or something equally obvious and non-stealthy, but her hand dropped from his arm and she turned her stunned look toward the front of the room.

"Excuse me, Mr. Anderson, do I have time to go to the restroom while you take attendance?"

"Sure, Rachel, go ahead." He let looking at Rachel give him an excuse to also look at Kurt with the tiniest plea in his eyes. As Rachel headed out the door, Kurt wrapped his hands around his seat and took some deep breaths. His mind was in turmoil and he wanted to cry because he didn't see how he could do this. But he'd promised Blaine. But Rachel knew.

He took out his number two pencil and stared at it. Memorized it. Concentrated with perfect attention on the green bands around the base, the brick red color of the eraser, the perfect point at the end. He just needed to find a way to get his equilibrium back and get through this damn class and then he and Blaine were going to do some serious renegotiating at lunchtime.

Rachel returned with perfect timing just as Blaine was finishing up attendance, and though she looked perfectly normal Kurt could see her hands trembling a little as she fished out her own pencil. But she gave him a genuine smile and whispered "We're so talking later" under her breath. He nodded at her and flipped over his paper at Blaine's direction to begin a test he already knew he was going to fail.

He was about four questions in, with no idea what he'd written for any of them, when Mr. Schuester appeared at the door, knocking lightly on the jamb, and went straight to Blaine to whisper in his ear. Blaine's eyes widened a little, and he glanced briefly at Kurt but then just nodded at Mr. Schue and left the room.

There was no chance of Kurt concentrating on his test now. He forced himself to stay quiet and wait for some kind of explanation, but Mr. Schue just settled himself at Blaine's desk and started scribbling notes on a piece of paper, humming under his breath. Finally Kurt couldn't stand it any longer and he raised his hand. "Excuse me, Mr. Schue. Where did Bl . . . Mr. Anderson go?"

"That doesn't really concern you, Kurt. Just finish your test."

Kurt was seriously abusing his thumbnail now and one foot was bouncing up and down without his permission. He lasted about twenty seconds before he tried again. "Mr. Schue . . ."

The teacher looked up with a sigh. "Principal Figgins just needed to talk to him for a minute. I'm sure he'll be right back."

Mr. Schue was probably right. It was probably nothing. The feeling Kurt had that something terrible was happening was just the monster inside him making a mountain out of a molehill. There was just some paper that had to be signed, or some piece of information missing from his file. It was nothing. Blaine was fine. He was going to sit here and pretend to finish his test and Blaine would walk in at any second and he'd laugh at himself for freaking out.

His resolve lasted three whole minutes, during which the monster paced and growled and told Kurt that a good dom, a _real_ dom, would go protect his sub from whatever he was enduring at the hands of Principal Figgins. And Kurt found he agreed with the monster.

Without another thought he was up out of his seat and out the door, ignoring Mr. Schuester's voice calling him back. He left all this things behind and practically ran through the maze of halls to the office. He arrived out of breath, his heart slamming around in his chest with the effort and anxiety and probably some overdramatic adrenaline response fueled by his out-of-control emotions. He paused in the outer office long enough to look around. Through the glass wall separating Principal Figgins' office from the rest of the room he could see Blaine standing on the far side of the room, saying something to the principal who was seated at his desk. There was someone else in the room as well, he could see the feet and legs of someone sitting on the couch, but a file cabinet blocked his view of the rest of whoever it was.  
>He didn't hesitate, just pushed through the little swinging door into the back part of the office and marched straight toward the principal's door.<p>

"Hey! You can't go in there!" Miss Bates called out frantically, but he ignored her and burst into the room to catch Principal Figgins mid-sentence. Three pairs of eyes turned astonished looks on him and suddenly Kurt's heart plummeted because he completely understood.

The other shoe had dropped.

The person sitting on the couch looking perfectly earnest and concerned was Dave Karofsky.

Kurt recovered fast. He turned on Dave and let all the morning's pent-up emotions fly.

"What the hell, Karofsky? Did you do this to Dr. Fletcher too? He didn't even touch you, did he? So getting one teacher fired wasn't' enough for you? Or is this about me?" He thought Dave might have flinched a little at that, but he ignored it and turned on Principal Figgins who was waving off Miss Bates' apologies. "Doesn't it seem a little suspicious to you that the same thing happens to him twice in less than a week?" he demanded.

Principal Figgins just kept his calm gaze on Kurt until Miss Bates had retreated and closed the door behind her. "Mr. Hummel," he said quietly, "Mr. Karofsky has made a serious accusation against Mr. Anderson."

Kurt really looked at Blaine then, and the misery and fear on Blaine's face made him shake even harder with anger. "Blaine never touched him," he insisted.

"Mr. Karofsky has not accused Mr. Anderson of inappropriate behavior with himself. He has accused Mr. Anderson of inappropriate behavior with you."

For a minute Kurt couldn't even understand what the principal had said. He stood with his mouth hanging open, still trembling with the need to protect and defend his sub, then he took one more look at the pain on Blaine's face and the monster in his chest that had been itching for a fight all day took over completely and it had the perfect target. He rounded on Karofsky, fists clenched and teeth gritted.

"What is wrong with you?!" he ground out, looming above Karofsky, whose cowering back into the cushions did nothing to assuage Kurt's fury. "God, I know you hate me but what the hell did Blaine ever do to you? Or do you have to destroy anyone who comes in contact with me just on principle?"

David's eyes never rose beyond Kurt's knees, but he spoke in a very small voice. "Kurt, I'm sorry, but . . . I saw you. Friday in the parking lot and . . . and this morning."

"Oh my God, are you stalking me now?"

"I just . . . I know how it feels . . . when someone pushes you that way . . . Dr. Fletcher . . ."

Kurt shook his head in disbelief. "Okay, I know you're stupid, but even you had to have notice that I'm a dom! He's the sub. I'm not you, Karofsky, and Blaine sure as hell isn't Dr. Fletcher. You have no idea what you've done!"

Principal Figgins cleared his throat to bring Kurt's attention back to himself. "So what you are saying, then, is that there is no inappropriate relationship between yourself and Mr. Anderson."

Kurt nodded once, fiercely. "Yes. That's what I'm saying."

"So Mr. Karofsky is mistaken and nothing of a sexual nature has ever occurred between you?" the principal continued.

Fuck.

Kurt stood poised on a knife's edge of uncertainty. He'd promised. He'd promised Blaine that they could keep things secret. He'd promised he'd keep Blaine safe from the censure he feared would automatically follow any revelation of their relationship. All he had to do was tell one small lie to the principal which, he told himself, was really okay because as a dom his first duty was to his sub.

But he couldn't do it. Maybe it was the fierce dominance he'd been struggling with all morning but to say that little word, _no_, was more than a lie. It was a denial of Blaine and himself and the wonderful, amazing thing that was happening between them. And he couldn't do it. He could not and would not deny his sub in the face of that direct question, even if it was what Blaine said he wanted. The other three were silent but their expressions egged him on. Principal Figgins looked like he was expecting the lie, and would welcome the opportunity to just put this all behind them. Blaine was begging Kurt with his eyes; his fear was palpable. And Karofsky almost cowered on the couch, like he'd actually thought he was doing something right but it had all gone horribly wrong. If he could just say no they could go back to class and this would all be over.

Instead, he turned and loomed again over the miserable-looking boy on the couch. "Leave," he said.

"Dude, I . . ."

"Get. Out." Kurt put every ounce of dominant command he could into the two words, and given how he'd been feeling all day that was quite a bit. He was sure he heard Karofsky whisper "Yes, Sir," under his breath as he shot out of his seat and through the glass door.

Kurt took a deep breath and turned to Blaine, who still looked miserable although realization was also starting to dawn. He tried to communicate silently all the things he couldn't actually say out loud. _"I'm sorry. There's no other way. Please trust me."_ He thought Blaine's head shook the tiniest bit but he had to ignore it. He wouldn't tell the lie that would get them off the hook, and the only way to tell the truth without causing serious trouble for Blaine was to tell the whole truth.

"Give me your hand," he commanded, trying with everything he had to sound strong and sure.

Blaine obeyed.

Staring as openly as he could into his sub's pleading golden eyes, Kurt undid the buckle on the black cuff and slipped it off Blaine's trembling arm. He tried to smile reassuringly as he tilted his head in Principal Figgins' direction. Blaine's lips pressed tight together, but he turned and held up his arm, just as he'd done for Kurt that first day in his office, so the principal could read Kurt's name on his wrist.

Figgins nodded. "Well. That changes things significantly. Of course, I'm going to have to ask to see your mark as well, Mr. Hummel. Unique as you may be, you're not the only Kurt Hummel in the world, I'm sure."

Kurt reached out to set Blaine's black cuff on the edge of the principal's desk then turned back to his sub. "Go ahead," he said and held his own arm out.

Blaine was still shaking enough that the buckle gave him some trouble, but he didn't look at it to help himself; he kept his eyes locked on Kurt's until the cuff was pulled off and Kurt took it from him with a grateful smile and turned to set it, too, on the desk before raising his arm to show his mark.

Principal Figgins raised an eyebrow and nodded. "All right then. Well. Happy ending for everyone, right?" Kurt was astonished that he could be so oblivious to the tension in the room. He'd just completely betrayed Blaine's trust, but hey, Principal Figgins didn't have to deal with another inappropriate teacher so . . . happy ending. He nodded.

"Of course," Figgins continue, "I will have to speak to the school district and see exactly what the policy is in such a situation, but you are clearly soulmates so I don't anticipate any trouble." His smile widened and he pushed himself up from his desk. "No, no trouble at all. I'll just use Miss Bates' phone to call and give you two some time to . . . get yourselves back together."

As the glass door closed Kurt could hear Blaine moving behind him but he couldn't bring himself to turn around. He couldn't face it. He'd done exactly what he'd promised Blaine they wouldn't do. He'd punished Blaine for failing his first real test of submission but even though Kurt knew he hadn't had any real choice, he felt like he'd failed a test of his own. Wouldn't a good dom have found a way to keep his sub safe while at the same time honoring his promise? How could Blaine ever trust him again? If he turned around and saw what he feared – that brick wall coming back up behind Blaine's eyes – he knew he was going to burst into tears right there.

But the only thing worse that what he'd done to Blaine was not facing the consequences. He turned around.

He had to bite the inside of his cheek until pain flared to hold back the tears.

Blaine looked miserable. He was scared, anxious, angry, worried, sad, resigned. Kurt could see just about every negative emotion there was on Blaine's face. But he could see them. Because Blaine wasn't hiding. Blaine was on his knees, face turned up to Kurt, showing him everything. Offering all of his feelings up to Kurt and begging silently for Kurt's _help_. He was turning to Kurt with all of his fears and under everything he could see . . . trust. Blaine believed in him. He still believed, in all of his fear and misery, that Kurt was the one who could give him what he needed.

For the first time Kurt understood in all of its powerful and wondrous force, that Blaine was his.

Kurt bit his cheek harder. Bursting into open sobs was so not the right thing to do at this moment.

Neither was falling to his knees and taking Blaine in his arms. He knew instinctively that was wrong. Instead he shifted his body so that he was between Blaine and the secretaries sitting on the other side of the glass wall and reached out to take Blaine's face in his hands. Blaine's eyes slipped closed momentarily when Kurt touched him, then he opened them again and they were a tiny bit clearer, as if Kurt's touch was already grounding him.

"It's going to be okay," Kurt said quietly. "I promise, Blaine. You're an amazing teacher and nobody's going to disrespect you because of me. I won't let them. I swear to God, I will kick the ass of anyone who tries."

A tiny smile tugged at the corners of Blaine's lips. "You have a lot of talents," he said shakily, "but I don't really think ass kicking is one of them."

"Then I'll get Puck to do it," Kurt smiled back gently, "or Karofsky. He owes us.

Blaine shook his head. "Not him. I don't want him getting the wrong idea. You're mine."

"He doesn't . . ."

"I saw the way he submitted to you. He does." Blaine's eyes were full of emotion. "Who wouldn't?"

Kurt's hands tightened a little and his fingers curled in Blaine's hair. "I'm so sorry about all this. I know I probably should have just lied to him, but I couldn't."

"I didn't want you to," Blaine said quickly, shaking his head again. "I was scared for people to know, but when he asked you that, I was more afraid of the lie. It's hard enough as it is, Kurt. If we can't be who we are to each other, that's just one more thing other people can use to hurt us. I was wrong to want to keep us a secret."

"No! You were just afraid. I get that."

Blaine smiled for real now, and held up his right hand to be cuffed. "Well, I'm not going to be afraid any more. How can I be, with you to take care of me?"

Kurt turned back to the desk and picked up Blaine's cuff. When he turned back to see his sub looking up at him with perfect trust one last realization struck him in a blinding flash of insight and he had to fight back tears yet again while he desperately wished they were anywhere but Principal Figgins' glass-walled office.

Because this was it. Despite all they'd done over the weekend, the punishment and the declarations and the sex and Blaine's acceptance of the black cuff, _this_ was their claiming. When they put on their cuffs and walked out the glass door it was together in every way. No more walls or secrets. Open for everyone to see. Someday when they told their grandchildren this story they'd probably laugh at how their defining moment had happened with only a glass partition between them and the curious stares of busy secretaries and misbehaving students and teachers wandering in to check their in boxes, but right now Kurt just fervently wished they were alone.

Blaine looked back up at him, open and serious, and Kurt could tell that he'd begun to understand the significance of the moment as well. "It's okay," he said with a tiny glance at the outer office, "go ahead." So Kurt took his hand and slid the cuff onto his wrist.

"I promise you," Kurt said, still gripping the black cuff that hung loose on Blaine's arm, "that I will take care of you and protect you and always, always keep you safe. I'll never let you be alone again, I swear." Blaine's free hand came up to press against Kurt's and Kurt finally lost his battle to keep the tears away – they filled his eyes and one or two trickled over down his cheeks. "And I promise we'll do absolutely everything you want to do, eventually. We'll make a contract and a huge list of things to try and I swear we'll do them all. And . . . and toys! I promise there'll be toys, boxes of them, as soon as I'm ready. Cuffs and paddles and . . . and hot pink vibrating dildos if that's what you want." They both laughed at that and Kurt loosened his grip on Blaine's hand just long enough to wipe at his damp cheeks. "I'm going to be the dom you need, Blaine. I swear I am."

"You already are," Blaine said as Kurt finally tightened the cuff on his arm.

Kurt turned back to the desk to pick up his own cuff and held it out. "Here, do me."

Blaine took the cuff and Kurt's left hand, and slipped the leather into place. "I promise," he said with a breath, "to trust you. To always trust you and believe in you and obey you. I promise not to hide from you ever again, that's over. I'm yours forever, Kurt. You and me, from now on." He looked down to fasten the clasp and then looked back up with twinkling eyes. "And I promise to let you torture me with that dildo as long as you want and love every second of it."

"Yes you will," Kurt said with mock seriousness as he pulled Blaine up to standing again. They just stood there, staring at each other, doing the lovesick puppy thing again, and Kurt thought this moment couldn't really get any more perfect.

Then Blaine reached out and tenderly cupped Kurt's cheek with his cuffed hand and said, "I love you so much."

Kurt's jaw dropped and his eyes went wide.

"You look just like a baby owl," Blaine said happily, stroking over the arch of Kurt's eyebrow and down his cheek.

"Oh, that's very sexy, thank you."

"On you it is," Blaine said.

"Is it true?" Kurt had to ask.

"Of course it is. Everything is sexy on you."

"You know what I mean." Kurt said with mock severity.

"Of course it's true," Blaine said. "You're my soulmate. That makes you the love of my life. I know. I looked it up." He suddenly burst into delighted laughter. "I'm so in love with you!"

"I love you too," Kurt breathed. He kissed Blaine swiftly then pulled him into his arms. And they stood like that; gripping each other tightly until they heard the door open and Principal Figgins cleared his throat. They parted then, but Kurt slipped his hand into Blaine's and squeezed tight.

"Well, good news for everyone, the district agrees that in the case of soulmates no special action needs to be taken." He seemed quite pleased with himself, as if he'd solved the whole problem single-handedly. "Of course, it would be unethical to have your own submissive evaluating your academic performance, Mr. Hummel," he told Kurt, "so tomorrow you will be transferred to Mrs. Delportillo's history class."

"That's fine," Kurt said.

"And it would be appreciated if you could keep any overt displays of dominance or such things to a minimum, at least where you can be seen by others. But all in all, I don't think this could have ended more perfectly!"

"Neither do I," Blaine said, tightening his grip on Kurt's hand.

"For now, though, you can both return to Mr. Anderson's classroom. Just for today."

Kurt paused just long enough to offer the principal a very sincere thank you, then pulled Blaine by the hand through the door and the outer office.

"Kurt, slow down!" Blaine pleaded breathlessly as Kurt dragged him down the hall toward his classroom.

"I can't!" Kurt turned around and kept walking backwards so he could face his beautiful, perfect sub. "I'm so happy. I don't think I've ever been this happy in my life." And it was true. The monster in his chest had transformed into a purring kitten and Blaine was the most amazing, lovely creature in the universe and now he had the happy task of telling everyone he knew that the world's hottest, most perfect sub belonged to him.

The hallway they were in was deserted, so he took the opportunity to kiss Blaine again, a proper claiming kiss, deep and hot and Blaine responded with his whole body, wrapping around Kurt and pulling him as close as he possibly could. And when they both were breathless and giggling like schoolgirls Kurt tugged at Blaine's hand and continued to pull him along the corridor toward the classroom where it had all begun.


	14. Chapter Fourteen

Friday afternoons were Blaine's favorite time of the week. Logically it should have been Friday night, or Saturday, or any point, really, during the forty-eight hours that he had Kurt all to himself, hours when they could sleep tangled up in each other, hours in which Blaine was (usually) allowed to come after the long week of denial and, more importantly, hours in which he could make Kurt come, over and over, as often as possible. Which for Kurt was a lot. For any other person the weekend would have been the best part.

But if the past two months had taught Blaine anything, it was that he was all about the build-up.

And that was something that Kurt instinctively understood. Often better than Blaine did himself. Certainly better than any dom Blaine had ever played with before, although to be fair his one-time-only policy didn't give any of them much of a chance to figure it out. Kurt somehow got that as much as Blaine absolutely, definitely wanted the explosive pleasure of orgasm, he also craved denial and the powerful act of submission it required. In fact, the more desperate his need and the more he begged and pleaded for release, the bigger that part of his brain that wanted more than anything for Kurt to enforce his dominance with a "no" became. And when he saw how it turned Kurt on to watch him struggle and fight back the pleasure his body craved, when he could bury his pleas against Kurt's chest and hear the way his heartbeat sped up as he teased and tormented Blaine's straining flesh; he felt like he could wait forever if that was what Kurt wanted.

Friday afternoons were all anticipation for Blaine. If Kurt was singing in Glee practice he would lurk outside the door of the choir room, leaning against the wall and losing himself in the spellbinding sound of Kurt's voice wrapping around a Broadway classic or a new standard. But as much as he loved listening to Kurt sing, the other Fridays, the ones he had to himself, were his favorite.

They had decided early on that Blaine wouldn't come unless Kurt was with him, which pretty much meant no orgasms at all during the week. Which was fine, really, because holding back and waiting for the weekend helped Blaine to feel Kurt's control even when their time together was limited to quick caresses in his office before school or the occasional heated make-out session at lunch. But no matter how much time they managed to carve out for each other, Blaine could never really allow himself to get lost in it. He could never forget that at the end there would be a roomful of students waiting for a teacher who had some idea of what he was saying and who definitely wasn't in a state of helpless, hard arousal. He could never really let himself enjoy that deep level of submission that his body and mind seem to fall into so easily any time Kurt's hands were on him.

But on Friday afternoons there was no one waiting for him but Kurt. Eventually they'd have to go to family dinner night at the Hummel-Hudsons', but Kurt always made sure there was time before that just for them, usually at Blaine's apartment, and although he almost never let Blaine come quite that soon he would let Blaine bring him off one way or another. Blaine had been surprised to discover that the longer he was denied, the more necessary Kurt's orgasm seemed to him. Making Kurt come left him feeling oddly satiated. Still horny and frustrated, but it was like some part of him shared in Kurt's release. His own need became less immediate and it was easier to get himself back under control.

Friday afternoons were all his. Blaine would wait for Kurt; kneeling on the little red pillow Kurt insisted he use. Blaine loved kneeling on the bare floor. He loved the slow, subtle building of the ache, so that the more perfectly still and obedient he was the more his body suffered, but on this issue Kurt had been adamant. "I expect to see you on those knees for at least fifty more years," he'd said. "You have to take care of them." And who could argue with that kind of logic? He knelt on the soft cushion and indulged himself in memories and fantasies and anticipation so that when he arrived Kurt always found him intensely aroused and floating already in the pliant, submissive headspace that they both loved so much.

And this Friday was extra-special. It was Kurt's birthday weekend and Friday dinner had been postponed to Saturday and turned into a party. So tonight they could do whatever Kurt wanted.

That afternoon Kurt had decided to fulfill a fantasy of Blaine's; something he'd been begging for for weeks. At lunch he had finally let Blaine blow him, sitting in the upholstered armchair in his office with the sounds of students milling around the hall outside filtering through the door. It had gotten inside his head in the most delicious way, serving Kurt like that with nothing but the door between them and the entire student population of McKinley. They'd done it right at the beginning of the period, so Blaine would have at least a half an hour to calm his body back down before class, but even with all that time he'd still had to do some careful adjustment before he could leave the room.

Now, kneeling on his little pillow in the soft glow of the desk lamp (another Kurt addition, as was the new chintz upholstered guest chair), Blaine let himself wallow in the intensity of that moment even more fully than he'd been able to do when it was happening. The soft sounds stifling in Kurt's throat. The hot, sharp taste of pre-come leaking in tiny surges from his cock. The way his hips had pushed up as he fucked himself into Blaine's mouth, deeper than he'd ever made him take it before, the tight pain of Kurt's fingers clenching in his hair (and he'd had to think some seriously unsexy thoughts then because the sharp sensation had almost sent him over the edge). And the coming. Nothing in the world was better than Kurt coming. If they lived in some bizarre world where only one of them could ever come again he'd choose Kurt every time. Knowing he was giving that kind of pleasure to his soulmate affected him in a way he couldn't even begin to describe.

He was so lost in the sensations of that afternoon that the sound of Kurt's key in the lock behind him startled him. Had an hour really passed so quickly? His cock jumped in its confines and his breathing sped up. Kurt was here.

As he did every Friday, Kurt locked the door without a word and knelt to wrap his arms around Blaine from behind, caressing across his chest, lips soft over the skin of his neck. Blaine leant back and melted into Kurt's embrace. It had become symbolic for him of the moment he could finally give up all control and turn himself completely over to his soulmate.

"Did you miss me?" Kurt murmured against Blaine's ear, his fingers dragging down to the hem of Blaine's shirt and sneaking under it to caress his skin.

"You know I did," Blaine whispered back.

"And are you hard for me?" The fingers slipped lower, finally, to press against Blaine's most definitely hard cock.

"You know I am. I always am."

"Mmmm. And that's what makes you the perfect sub." Blaine could hear the smile in Kurt's voice even through the haze of arousal that Kurt's hands were creating, spiraling pleasure through his body as they ghosted over his hard length.

"Guess what I did last night?" Kurt asked, with a press against Blaine's groin that made him suck in a sharp breath.

"I know what you did last night," Blaine said when he could speak again. "You made me listen on the phone while you did it."

"You loved that."

"I did." He turned his head just a little, begging gently, and Kurt responded by capturing Blaine's lips with his own and dipping his tongue in to meet Blaine's, but all too soon he was pulling away, his eyes sparkling as he shifted to sit on the floor next to Blaine, one hand still teasing against his erection.

"I meant afterwards, while you were laying there all desperate and frustrated. I was on the computer making a list."

"Another list?"

"Uh-huh. I printed out the longest, the most comprehensive list of sexual kinks I could find." Blaine gasped at that, and couldn't keep the hopeful look off his face. "And we're going back to your place and we're going to go over every single one in exhaustive detail. Because we need a contract."

Blaine leaned forward and pressed his forehead to Kurt's. "Please tell me you're going to let me come before we do that. I might not survive it if you don't."

Kurt's hands came up to cup Blaine's cheeks and push him back just a little. One eyebrow lifted in question. "Do you want me to let you come or is that your way of asking me to make you wait? What do you really want?"

Kurt knew him far too well. The answer was obvious. "I want whatever's going to turn you on the most."

"God, I love you," Kurt smiled like the sun and then rewarded him with another kiss, this one deep and lingering. He pressed himself up on his knees, because he knew how much Blaine loved it when he had to crane and reach to keep their lips touching. When he finally pulled away Kurt's eyes were still shining with love and something else.

"What would turn me on the most," he said with a smile, "would be for you to wait to come until I'm fucking you."

He didn't quite manage to get it out without blushing, but Blaine was much too busy forgetting how to breathe to notice. When he finally managed to speak his voice trembled. "Does that mean . . . ?"

Kurt nodded.

"And you mean tonight, right? Not next month or something – tonight?"

Kurt's hand made its way back to Blaine's crotch. "Do I have to punish you for underestimating me again?"

"God no. I definitely won't make it until we get home if you do." He stroked down Kurt's arm and clutched at his hand. "Are you really serious?" he asked.

"You know, for someone who once told me intercourse wasn't that important, you seem pretty excited," Kurt teased.

"No, I said it wasn't _necessary_. But . . . God, Kurt, you have no idea what it does to me, the thought of you . . . inside me . . ." In fact, he needed to stop thinking about it right now, or it was going to do much too much to him.

Kurt stood up and pulled Blaine with him. "Let's go home so I can see what it does to you."

On Fridays Kurt always picked Blaine up in the morning so that they could ride back to his apartment together and Blaine had never been more grateful for that than he was today. He was so aroused that he had to hold the seatbelt away from his body – he was afraid just the pressure of it could push him over the edge. The thought of what they were going to do – of Kurt making love to him that way – was far too much to handle in his already desperate state. They talked, of course, about Glee practice and some interesting thing Kurt had learned in dom class Wednesday night, but Blaine's mind wasn't really on anything he was saying. Instead he watched Kurt as he drove, the shape of his jaw, the way his hair swept back from his forehead, the long, perfect fingers curled around the steering wheel. He just couldn't figure out how he'd managed to get so lucky. How he'd managed to get to this place with Kurt, without completely screwing everything up with his insecurity and fear and damaged expectations.

That first day all he could think was that he'd deserved better, but now he knew he could never come close to deserving Kurt. He had no idea why fate had decided they belonged together, but he would be grateful to it for the rest of his life. And grateful to Kurt for never giving up on him.

They parked in front of Blaine's building and walked hand in hand to the door. Once inside, Blaine bustled around putting away his jacket and bag, but turned to find that Kurt was pressed against the door like he was glued to it. He reminded Blaine of himself, the first time they'd come here together, when he'd felt like taking a few steps into the room would be committing to a course of action he wasn't at all sure he was ready for.

"Hey," he said softly, moving closer to take Kurt's hands in his. "Are you okay?"

Kurt smiled the lopsided smile that meant that he wasn't quite okay. "I guess I'm just a little nervous."

"We don't have to do anything you don't want to do. What's our first rule?"

"You don't come without my permission."

Blaine smiled and shook his head. "That's the second rule. The first rule is that you set the pace, remember? And I agreed to that. I don't want to do anything you're not comfortable with."

Kurt squeezed Blaine's hands and his shoulders lifted in a tiny shrug. "I really do want to. I just . . . I have no idea what I'm doing. I mean, I read some stuff but . . ."

"How about this?" Blaine said. "I'll go in the bathroom and get myself ready for you, and when I come out we can do whatever you want. No pressure. We can hit that kink list and see how far we get before I lose my mind. Or we can just cuddle on the couch and I'll beg you let me blow you or something."

"So, basically, a normal Friday?" Kurt smiled.

"A normal Friday."

Blaine started to move away, but Kurt kept hold of his hands and pulled him back. "I'm just . . . I mean, what if I can't be – dominant, the way you need me to? What if I mess up?"

"Is that what you're worried about?"

Kurt nodded, biting his bottom lip in the way that Blaine always found so endearing.

"Then we'll have perfectly vanilla sex. Or I'll boss you around for a change. But really, I'm not worried. I don't think you could avoid being dominant if you tried."

"Really?" Kurt asked skeptically.

"Voice of experience here."

"I love you," Kurt sighed and pressed a gentle kiss against Blaine's lips. When he pulled away the usual fire was back in his eyes. "So you're going to go to the bathroom and get yourself ready. For me. And then when you come out, I'm going to fuck you."

"Nice. You hardly blushed at all that time," Blaine teased.

"Don't get smart with me. I don't have to let you come, you know."

"I love you!" Blaine called out as he danced away down the hall.

Of course, in the end, Blaine did come. They tumbled and kissed and giggled like ten-year-olds, but eventually the kisses deepened, the breathing became harsher, the giggles turned into gasps and stuttered moans, hands fumbled with lube and condoms, and Blaine spread himself for his lover, begging with his body and his eyes and his voice to be filled and taken and owned.

Then Kurt was right there, pausing on the threshold of yet another kind of commitment, slick and ready.

"Put your hands up against the headboard," he said.

Blaine shook his head. "Please. I need to touch you."

"I'll let you, I promise. But right now put your hands up. I just want you to feel this."

Blaine pressed his palms against the flat wood of the headboard and immediately knew how right it was. He always felt so raw and vulnerable when Kurt made him do this, no ties or cuffs, just held in place by his own willing submission. There weren't even any slats or spindles to grasp, his hands could easily slip away as he got lost in sensation and the struggle to keep them in place no matter what Kurt was doing to him twisted inside him in so many enticing ways.

So he offered himself up, exposed and defenseless, and Kurt gave him a beautiful smile and slowly pushed forward. And the way Kurt's eyes fell closed as he surrendered to sensation, the way Blaine's body slowly adjusted and shaped itself to Kurt's advancing cock, it was all so much more than Blaine had ever imagined it would be.

When he was all the way in, filling Blaine completely, Kurt leaned forward and kissed Blaine hard, almost biting at his lips and then he pulled back, withdrew as far as he could, and plunged back in with a long, soft groan.

"Oh God, please let me touch you. I need to hold you, Kurt."

But Kurt shook his head. "Just a few more times. I want to . . . how do I find . . .?"

"Here . . ." Blaine adjusted his hips a little on the pillows that supported them, tilting for the right angle. "You have to kind of come up at me, from below a little. Pull out then just . . . ohhhh."

The long slow stroke brushed in just the right place and Blaine could feel it sparking throughout his entire body.

"I think I found it." Kurt pulled back and thrust again at exactly the same angle, pulling another sharp moan from Blaine's throat.

"Tell me . . . how it feels. How do I feel to you?" Blaine panted.

"Hot," Kurt said, stroking again and hitting so perfectly that Blaine was starting to worry about his ability to hold back. "Tight . . . it's so amazing, Blaine." His voice was light and breathy. "I don't think this is going to last very long."

"Please . . . touch . . ."

"One more, then you can move your hands." Kurt took a fifth long stroke. As soon as he was buried deep again Blaine grabbed for his ass, clutching at the muscles there exactly as he'd fantasized about so many times.

"Oh, fuck it," Kurt said in a wrecked voice, not a hint of blush in sight. He began to thrust hard and fast, grabbing Blaine's leaking cock with his still-slick hand and pumping just as fast, driving them both relentlessly toward release.

The need and desperation and pure, white-hot pleasure were reaching an irresistible peak inside Blaine's body. Kurt's hand was relentless, his cock merciless, and there was no way, not a chance in hell that Blaine was going to be able to hold back the orgasm barreling toward him like a freight train.

"Can I come?" he begged, "I can't stop it Kurt, it's too much, please . . ."

"Do it," Kurt commanded between gasps.

When Blaine finally let go it was like the world stopped. The ecstasy that exploded out from the epicenter of Kurt's hand, stroking hard and fast, and shot at light speed through every nerve and muscle and cell of his body overwhelmed all his senses. He was blind and deaf to everything but the long-awaited swell of orgasm and the slide of Kurt's cock over his prostate, dragging it out longer and longer. Then Kurt's body slammed to a stop and Blaine was still coming but he wrapped his arms around Kurt and held on with every ounce of strength he possessed as they both shuddered and gasped and cried out their pleasure.

Eventually, they collapsed in a heap, both laughing, lips finding each other in short, soft kisses. Blaine had never felt more at home than he did right there, under Kurt's body, shaking with semi-suppressed laughter, the pressure in Blaine's ass receding as Kurt's cock slowly softened.

"Well, I told you it wasn't going to last very long," Kurt said ruefully.

But Blaine wasn't going to complain that his earth-shattering orgasm had come too fast. "Well that's the benefit of a teenage boyfriend. Recovery time." He smiled. But his smile turned to a pout as Kurt began to pull out of his body. "No. Don't go yet."

"I have to. The condom box says . . ."

"Of course you read the box."

Kurt smiled. "I'm the responsible one, remember?" And with that he was gone, leaving Blaine to whine just a little at the emptiness while he disposed of the condom.  
>"Don't worry. I'm pretty sure we're going to do that again some time."<p>

Blaine grinned and reached out to pull Kurt back down on top of him, ignoring the mess between their bodies, stroking his hands down Kurt's back and over his ass, where he was sure his clutching fingers must have left bruises. "Do you have any idea how much in love with you I am?"

"I think I'm starting to figure it out," Kurt smiled back. He kissed Blaine properly then, slow and teasing and hot, but eventually the stickiness of Blaine's come made him squirm. "We definitely need to clean up."

"I'll get it," Blaine said, rolling Kurt to the side and dropping one last kiss on his lips. He started to get up, but Kurt grabbed his hand. When he turned back there was a shyness in Kurt's eyes that he hadn't seen for a long time.

"Do you ever think about him?" Kurt asked quietly.

"Who?"

"You know . . . fantasy Kurt. Do you ever miss him or pretend . . .?"

Blaine forgot all about the drying come on his belly. He sat back down and reached to stroke Kurt's face, down his cheek, over the dimple in his chin. "How could I miss him? He's right here."

Kurt frowned. "You don't have to do that. We both know I'm not what you expected all those years."

Blaine scooted closer and stared deep into Kurt's questioning eyes. "No. You're not. I never expected someone who would break down all my barriers and crawl inside my heart the way you did. I never expected someone who would see, really see, what I needed and not just what thought I wanted or what I could offer. Fuck what I expected. You're so beautiful, Kurt, and you've given me so much more than I ever knew I wanted." He wiped at his eyes. "And now you're making me cry, damn it."

Kurt laughed and tightened his grip on Blaine's hand. "So you don't regret . . . me? I mean, now you've got to put your life on hold for another year until I graduate, and I know not everyone at school has handled it well . . ."

"Okay, first, I'm a big boy and I can take it if not everyone approves of me. And as for putting my life on hold – don't you know that this is exactly the opposite? All those years, waiting for you, that's when my life was on hold. This is the first time I actually feel like I'm living it."

Kurt leaned in to kiss him, but made a face with the movement pulled at the mess on his skin. "Oh God, I really need a washcloth."

"Yes, Sir," Blaine teased as jumped to obey.

Kurt watched Blaine's bare ass as it disappeared around the corner to fetch something to clean them with. When it was gone, he fell back on the bed and let the tension run out of his body.

This was what made it all worthwhile. Sometimes it threatened to overwhelm him, all the things he needed to do, all the people who wanted something from him. There was Glee club, and all the frantic extra practicing as they prepared for Nationals, and dom classes, where he worked extra hard to wrap his brain around ideas and lessons that, while abstract for most of the students, were very immediate and concrete for him. And then there was the pressure of schoolwork, and planning for his future, and just trying to share himself with his friends and still make time for Blaine. There were worries about how everyone was adjusting to the fact that he was in a soulmate claim. And it was in Kurt's nature to take everyone else's problems on himself and try to make things okay for them.

But Blaine was his haven. With Blaine he had decided right at the start that he wasn't going to try to second-guess himself or be something that he wasn't. He acted on instinct, did what felt right and good to him and trusted that it would be right and good for Blaine too. But to hear him say it out loud like that took Kurt's breath away. Everything Kurt had said that first day in Blaine's office was right. They were exactly perfectly matched. They each complemented the other in so many unexpected ways. With Blaine it was effortless. He'd met the love of his life when he was sixteen. He wasn't sure why he was allowed to be so happy, but he wasn't going to question it.

Blaine was back quickly, warm washcloth in hand. "Don't move," he said when Kurt started to sit up. He crawled up next to Kurt and gently began washing the come from his body. Kurt closed his eyes and let himself be cared for, tiny sounds rumbling in his throat as the warm water and Blaine's hands did their work.

"If you keep making noises like that I'm going to get hard again," Blaine said. He set the cloth on the night stand and turned back. "Are you hungry? Should we do something about dinner?"

Kurt shook his head and held out his arms. "Cuddle first." Blaine settled against him, head on his chest, one arm wrapped around Kurt's waist.

They did so many wonderful, sexy, erotic things together, but this was Kurt's favorite. He would never get tired of how it felt when Blaine just rested his weight against him, warm and heavy, and let himself be held. This, more than obeying commands or waiting to come or anything, made him feel like Blaine was his. And when Blaine's breathing deepened and Kurt realized he was falling asleep, he smiled and tightened his grip even more.

He didn't intend to nap – he didn't even really feel tired. But the slow even rhythm of Blaine's breathing and the solid comfort of his weight pushing Kurt into the mattress worked a gentle spell on his brain and soon he too was drifting gently toward sleep.

Just an ordinary Friday night, was his last thought before sleep claimed him, no different, really, from any other and yet totally unique. One of thousands they would share during their years together.

So the earth turned, and the room dipped into darkness, and safe in each other's arms, they slept.


End file.
